crottevsculotteTell them apart

Which to use

“crotte” and “culotte” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#22,221
“crotte” frequency rank
#9,980
“culotte” frequency rank
32201
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature crotte culotte
Definition Fiente, en forme de boulettes, de certains animaux. Pantalon court.

Where the eye mixes crotte and culotte

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. crotte runs 6 letters (CCVCCV) against culotte's 7 (CVCVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
crotte
7 ch
culotte

Why the eye confuses crotte with culotte

A purely visual mix-up. crotte (\kʁɔt\) and culotte (\ky.lɔt\) 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 32201, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

crotte is recorded at frequency rank #22,221, classified as anoun, pronounced \kʁɔt\. culotte is at rank #9,980, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ky.lɔt\.

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 32201, this pair ranks #298,844 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of crotte vs culotte

Shared letters: ceot. Private to "crotte": r. Private to "culotte": lu.

"crotte" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV  ·  "culotte" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • crotte ← ccrotte · cortte · crote · crotet · crrotte · crtote · rcotte
  • culotte ← cculotte · cluotte · cullotte · culote · culotet · cultote · cuoltte · uclotte

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "crotte" and "culotte" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\kʁɔt\ versus \ky.lɔt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "crotte" vs "culotte" - which ranks higher?
"culotte" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,980 in our French list, against #22,221 for "crotte". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "crotte" and "culotte" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "crotte" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "culotte" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #298,844 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "crotte" and "culotte" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cotta vs crotte". 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 #298,844 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list