escalevsespaceWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#11,580
“escale” frequency rank
#739
“espace” frequency rank
12319
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature escale espace
Definition Endroit où des navires peuvent relâcher. Étendue indéfinie.

Where the eye mixes escale and espace

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

6 ch
escale
6 ch
espace

Visual trap between escale and espace

A purely visual mix-up. escale (\ɛs.kal\) and espace (\ɛs.pas\) 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 12319, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

escale is recorded at frequency rank #11,580, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɛs.kal\. espace is at rank #739, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛs.pas\.

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 12319, this pair ranks #405,757 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of escale vs espace

Shared letters: aces. Private to "escale": l. Private to "espace": p.

"escale" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV  ·  "espace" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • escaleecsale · esacle · escael · escalle · esccale · esclae · esscale · secale
  • espaceepsace · esapce · espacce · espaec · espcae · esppace · esspace · sepace

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "escale" and "espace" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ɛs.kal\ versus \ɛs.pas\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "escale" or "espace"?
"espace" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #739 in our French list, against #11,580 for "escale". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "escale" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "espace" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #405,757 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "escale" and "espace" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "espace vs España". 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 #405,757 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