Which to use
“crest” and “crew” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #42,256
- “crest” frequency rank
- #20,685
- “crew” frequency rank
- 62941
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | crest | crew |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Arête, crête. | Groupe. |
Where the eye mixes crest and crew
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: crest vs crew
A purely visual mix-up. crest (\ˈkɹɛst\) and crew (\kʁu\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62941, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
crest is recorded at frequency rank #42,256, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈkɹɛst\. crew is at rank #20,685, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kʁu\.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 62941, this pair ranks #84,434 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of crest vs crew
Shared letters: cer. Private to "crest": st. Private to "crew": w.
"crest" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC · "crew" · 4 letters · shape CCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "crest" and "crew" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "crest" or "crew" show up more?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "crest" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "crew" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #84,434 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "crest" and "crew" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cese vs crest". Nearby pair
- Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes
Confusion rank #84,434 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.