gammesvsgemmeTell them apart

Which to use

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

#19,841
“gammes” frequency rank
#35,963
“gemme” frequency rank
55804
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature gammes gemme
Definition Pluriel de gamme (sens courants). Pierre fine, pierre précieuse, pierre ornementale ou synthétique répondant à des critères de dureté, d’éclat, de couleur et de transparence.

Where the eye mixes gammes and gemme

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. gammes runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against gemme's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
gammes
5 ch
gemme

Look-alike desk: gammes vs gemme

A purely visual mix-up. gammes (\ɡam\) and gemme (\ʒɛm\) 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 55804, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

gammes is recorded at frequency rank #19,841, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɡam\. gemme is at rank #35,963, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʒɛm\.

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 55804, this pair ranks #125,127 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of gammes vs gemme

Shared letters: egm. Private to "gammes": as. Private to "gemme": -.

"gammes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "gemme" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • gammes ← agmmes · gamems · gammess · gammse · ggammes · gmames
  • gemme ← egmme · geme · gemem · ggemme · gmeme

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "gammes" and "gemme" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ɡam\ versus \ʒɛm\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "gammes" or "gemme" show up more?
"gammes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,841 in our French list, against #35,963 for "gemme". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "gammes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "gemme" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #125,127 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "gammes" and "gemme" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "gégé vs gemme". 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 #125,127 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