glacevsglacisWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#1,954
“glace” frequency rank
#40,786
“glacis” frequency rank
42740
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature glace glacis
Definition ou Eau à l’état solide. Talus, pente douce et unie.

Where the eye mixes glace and glacis

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

5 ch
glace
6 ch
glacis

Look-alike desk: glace vs glacis

A purely visual mix-up. glace (\ɡlas\) and glacis (\ɡla.si\) 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 42740, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

glace is recorded at frequency rank #1,954, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɡlas\. glacis is at rank #40,786, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɡla.si\.

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 42740, this pair ranks #223,285 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of glace vs glacis

Shared letters: acgl. Private to "glace": e. Private to "glacis": is.

"glace" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "glacis" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • glace ← galce · gglace · glacce · glaec · glcae · gllace · lgace
  • glacis ← galcis · gglacis · glaccis · glaciss · glacsi · glaics · glcais · gllacis

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "glace" and "glacis" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\ɡlas\ versus \ɡla.si\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "glace" vs "glacis" - which ranks higher?
"glace" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,954 in our French list, against #40,786 for "glacis". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "glace" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "glacis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #223,285 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "glace" and "glacis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "glacis vs gracie". 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 #223,285 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