dancervsdansesWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#41,214
“dancer” frequency rank
#9,466
“danses” frequency rank
50680
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dancer danses
Definition Danseur, danseuse. Pluriel de danse.

Where the eye mixes dancer and danses

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
dancer
6 ch
danses

Why the eye confuses dancer with danses

A purely visual mix-up. dancer (\ˈdɑːns.ə(ɹ)\) and danses (\dɑ̃s\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50680, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dancer is recorded at frequency rank #41,214, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈdɑːns.ə(ɹ)\. danses is at rank #9,466, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dɑ̃s\.

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 50680, this pair ranks #160,758 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dancer vs danses

Shared letters: aden. Private to "dancer": cr. Private to "danses": s.

"dancer" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "danses" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • danceradncer · dacner · danccer · dancerr · dancre · danecr · danncer · ddancer
  • dansesadnses · daness · dannses · dansess · dansses · dasnes · ddanses · dnases

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "dancer" and "danses" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\ˈdɑːns.ə(ɹ)\ versus \dɑ̃s\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "dancer" or "danses" show up more?
"danses" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,466 in our French list, against #41,214 for "dancer". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dancer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "danses" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #160,758 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dancer" and "danses" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dancer vs dansez". 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 #160,758 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