flicvsflintWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#6,194
“flic” frequency rank
#34,540
“flint” frequency rank
40734
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature flic flint
Definition Policier. Verre en cristal servant avec le crown-glass à faire les lentilles achromatiques des microscopes ; il est constitué par trois atomes de quadrisilicate de plomb et deux atomes de quadrisilicate de potasse.

Where the eye mixes flic and flint

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
flic
5 ch
flint

Look-alike desk: flic vs flint

A purely visual mix-up. flic (\flik\) and flint (\flint\) 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 40734, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

flic is recorded at frequency rank #6,194, classified as anoun, pronounced \flik\. flint is at rank #34,540, tagged as anoun, pronounced \flint\.

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 40734, this pair ranks #238,296 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of flic vs flint

Shared letters: fil. Private to "flic": c. Private to "flint": nt.

"flic" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "flint" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • flicfflic · filc · flci · flicc · fllic · lfic
  • flintfflint · filnt · flinnt · flintt · flitn · fllint · flnit · lfint

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "flic" and "flint" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\flik\ versus \flint\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "flic" vs "flint" - which ranks higher?
"flic" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,194 in our French list, against #34,540 for "flint". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "flic" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "flint" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #238,296 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "flic" and "flint" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "flint vs foins". 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 #238,296 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