Which to use
“école” is a noun and “écrie” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #421
- “école” frequency rank
- #43,224
- “écrie” frequency rank
- 43645
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | école | écrie |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Lieu dédié à l’apprentissage. | Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de écrier. |
Where the eye mixes école and écrie
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. école (VCVCV) and écrie (VCCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Visual trap between école and écrie
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: école is \e.kɔl\ while écrie is \e.kʁi\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43645, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
école is recorded at frequency rank #421, classified as anoun, pronounced \e.kɔl\. écrie is at rank #43,224, tagged as averb, pronounced \e.kʁi\.
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 43645, this pair ranks #216,472 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of école vs écrie
Shared letters: ceé. Private to "école": lo. Private to "écrie": ir.
"école" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV · "écrie" · 5 letters · shape VCCVV
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "école" and "écrie" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "école" or "écrie"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "école" and "écrie" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "école" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "écrie" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #216,472 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "école" and "écrie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "écrie vs éprise". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #216,472 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.