Which to use
“encourage” and “encourager” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #7,313
- “encourage” frequency rank
- #4,857
- “encourager” frequency rank
- 12170
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | encourage | encourager |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de encourager. | Inciter à avoir du courage. |
Where the eye mixes encourage and encourager
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence. encourage runs 9 letters (VCCVVCVCV) against encourager's 10 (VCCVVCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between encourage and encourager
A purely visual mix-up. encourage (\ɑ̃.ku.ʁaʒ\) and encourager (\ɑ̃.ku.ʁa.ʒe\) 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 extra letter(s) - “encourage” sits inside “encourager”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12170, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
encourage is recorded at frequency rank #7,313, classified as averb, pronounced \ɑ̃.ku.ʁaʒ\. encourager is at rank #4,857, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɑ̃.ku.ʁa.ʒe\.
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 12170, this pair ranks #406,311 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of encourage vs encourager
Shared letters: acegnoru. Private to "encourage": -. Private to "encourager": -.
"encourage" · 9 letters · shape VCCVVCVCV · "encourager" · 10 letters · shape VCCVVCVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- encourage ← ecnourage · enccourage · encoruage · encouarge · encouraeg · encouragge · encourgae · encourrage
- encourager ← ecnourager · enccourager · encoruager · encouarger · encouraegr · encouragerr · encouragger · encouragre
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "encourage" and "encourager" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "encourage" or "encourager"?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "encourage" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "encourager" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #406,311 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "encourage" and "encourager" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "encourage vs encouragez". 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 #406,311 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.