decovsdécoteWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#26,324
“deco” frequency rank
#41,242
“décote” frequency rank
67566
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature deco décote
Definition Décence. Réduction de la cote, baisse de la valeur.

Where the eye mixes deco and décote

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. deco runs 4 letters (CVCV) against décote's 6 (CVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
deco
6 ch
décote

Visual trap between deco and décote

A purely visual mix-up. deco (\ˈdɛ.ʦɔ\) and décote (\de.kɔt\) 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 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67566, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

deco is recorded at frequency rank #26,324, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈdɛ.ʦɔ\. décote is at rank #41,242, tagged as anoun, pronounced \de.kɔt\.

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 67566, this pair ranks #62,864 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of deco vs décote

Shared letters: cdeo. Private to "deco": -. Private to "décote": té.

"deco" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "décote" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • deco ← dceo · ddeco · decco · deoc · edco

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "deco" and "décote" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\ˈdɛ.ʦɔ\ versus \de.kɔt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "deco" vs "décote" - which ranks higher?
"deco" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,324 in our French list, against #41,242 for "décote". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "deco" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "décote" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #62,864 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "deco" and "décote" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dèche vs décote". 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 #62,864 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