excédentsvsexcrémentsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#30,597
“excédents” frequency rank
#23,542
“excréments” frequency rank
54139
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature excédents excréments
Definition Pluriel de excédent. Pluriel de excrément.

Where the eye mixes excédents and excréments

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 8 letters in sequence. excédents runs 9 letters (VCCVCVCCC) against excréments's 10 (VCCCVCVCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

9 ch
excédents
10 ch
excréments

Look-alike desk: excédents vs excréments

A purely visual mix-up. excédents (\ɛk.se.dɑ̃\) and excréments (\ɛks.kʁe.mɑ̃\) 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 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 54139, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

excédents is recorded at frequency rank #30,597, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɛk.se.dɑ̃\. excréments is at rank #23,542, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛks.kʁe.mɑ̃\.

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 54139, this pair ranks #136,004 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of excédents vs excréments

Shared letters: censtxé. Private to "excédents": d. Private to "excréments": mr.

"excédents" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCVCCC  ·  "excréments" · 10 letters · shape VCCCVCVCCC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "excédents" for "excréments" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ɛk.se.dɑ̃\ versus \ɛks.kʁe.mɑ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "excédents" or "excréments"?
"excréments" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,542 in our French list, against #30,597 for "excédents". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "excédents" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "excréments" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #136,004 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "excédents" and "excréments" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "excédant vs excédents". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #136,004 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