excluesvsexcusesTell them apart

Quick tell: exclues is a adjective, excuses is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“exclues” is an adjective and “excuses” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#24,966
“exclues” frequency rank
#3,914
“excuses” frequency rank
28880
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature exclues excuses
Definition Féminin pluriel de exclu. Pluriel de excuse.

Where the eye mixes exclues and excuses

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. exclues (VCCCVVC) and excuses (VCCVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
exclues
7 ch
excuses

Look-alike desk: exclues vs excuses

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: exclues is \ɛks.kly\ while excuses is \ɛks.kyz\. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 28880, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

exclues is recorded at frequency rank #24,966, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɛks.kly\. excuses is at rank #3,914, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛks.kyz\.

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 28880, this pair ranks #320,076 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of exclues vs excuses

Shared letters: cesux. Private to "exclues": l. Private to "excuses": -.

"exclues" · 7 letters · shape VCCCVVC  ·  "excuses" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • excluesecxlues · excclues · excleus · excllues · excluess · excluse · excules · exlcues
  • excusesecxuses · exccuses · excsues · excuess · excusess · excusses · exucses · exxcuses

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "exclues" and "excuses" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "exclues" is an adjective and "excuses" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "exclues" or "excuses" show up more?
"excuses" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,914 in our French list, against #24,966 for "exclues". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "exclues" and "excuses" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "exclues" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "excuses" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #320,076 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "exclues" and "excuses" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "évolués vs exclues". 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 #320,076 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