Which to use
“friche” and “frise” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #26,735
- “friche” frequency rank
- #17,430
- “frise” frequency rank
- 44165
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | friche | frise |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Terrain inculte, soit qu’on ne l’ait jamais cultivé, soit que la culture en ait été interrompue. | Partie de l’entablement qui est entre l’architrave et la corniche. |
Where the eye mixes friche and frise
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. friche runs 6 letters (CCVCCV) against frise's 5 (CCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: friche vs frise
A purely visual mix-up. friche (\fʁiʃ\) and frise (\fʁiz\) 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 44165, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
friche is recorded at frequency rank #26,735, classified as anoun, pronounced \fʁiʃ\. frise is at rank #17,430, tagged as anoun, pronounced \fʁiz\.
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 44165, this pair ranks #212,540 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of friche vs frise
Shared letters: efir. Private to "friche": ch. Private to "frise": s.
"friche" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV · "frise" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "friche" for "frise" ever safe?
Frequency check: "friche" vs "frise" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "friche" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "frise" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #212,540 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "friche" and "frise" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "friche vs fringe". 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 #212,540 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.