exercicevsexercicesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#1,661
“exercice” frequency rank
#5,131
“exercices” frequency rank
6792
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature exercice exercices
Definition Action d’exercer ou de s’exercer. Pluriel de exercice.

Same sound, different letters: exercice vs exercices

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 8 letters.

8 ch
exercice
9 ch
exercices

Same sound, different spelling - exercice / exercices

This is the hard kind. exercice and exercices are pronounced identically (\ɛɡ.zɛʁ.sis\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “exercice” sits inside “exercices”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 6792, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

exercice is recorded at frequency rank #1,661, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɛɡ.zɛʁ.sis\. exercices is at rank #5,131, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛɡ.zɛʁ.sis\.

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 6792, this pair ranks #425,220 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of exercice vs exercices

Shared letters: ceirx. Private to "exercice": -. Private to "exercices": s.

"exercice" · 8 letters · shape VCVCCVCV  ·  "exercices" · 9 letters · shape VCVCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • exerciceeexrcice · execrice · exerccice · exerccie · exercicce · exerciec · exericce · exerrcice
  • exerciceseexrcices · execrices · exerccices · exerccies · exercicces · exercicess · exercicse · exerciecs

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "exercice" and "exercices" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\ɛɡ.zɛʁ.sis\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "exercice" vs "exercices" - which ranks higher?
"exercice" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,661 in our French list, against #5,131 for "exercices". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "exercice" / "exercices". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "exercice" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "exercices" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #425,220 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "exercice" and "exercices" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "exercées vs exercices". 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 #425,220 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