écologievseconomieTell them apart

Which to use

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

#5,092
“écologie” frequency rank
#5,973
“economie” frequency rank
11065
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature écologie economie
Definition Partie de la biologie qui étudie les relations et les interactions entre un organisme vivant et son milieu de vie. Pluriel de economia.

Where the eye mixes écologie and economie

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. écologie and economie follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCVCVCVV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

8 ch
écologie
8 ch
economie

Look-alike desk: écologie vs economie

A purely visual mix-up. écologie (\e.kɔ.lɔ.ʒi\) and economie (\e.ko.no.ˈmi.e\) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11065, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

écologie is recorded at frequency rank #5,092, classified as anoun, pronounced \e.kɔ.lɔ.ʒi\. economie is at rank #5,973, tagged as anoun, pronounced \e.ko.no.ˈmi.e\.

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 11065, this pair ranks #410,593 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of écologie vs economie

Shared letters: ceio. Private to "écologie": glé. Private to "economie": mn.

"écologie" · 8 letters · shape VCVCVCVV  ·  "economie" · 8 letters · shape VCVCVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • economieceonomie · ecconomie · ecnoomie · econmoie · econnomie · econoime · economei · econommie

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "écologie" and "economie" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\e.kɔ.lɔ.ʒi\ versus \e.ko.no.ˈmi.e\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "écologie" or "economie"?
"écologie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,092 in our French list, against #5,973 for "economie". 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 "écologie" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "economie" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #410,593 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "écologie" and "economie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "économes vs economie". 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 #410,593 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