gossevsgrosseConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#4,492
“gosse” frequency rank
#981
“grosse” frequency rank
5473
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature gosse grosse
Definition Enfant, garçon ou fille. Une douzaine de douzaines.

Where the eye mixes gosse and grosse

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

5 ch
gosse
6 ch
grosse

Why the eye confuses gosse with grosse

A purely visual mix-up. gosse (\ɡɔs\) and grosse (\ɡʁos\) 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 5473, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

gosse is recorded at frequency rank #4,492, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɡɔs\. grosse is at rank #981, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɡʁos\.

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 5473, this pair ranks #428,922 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of gosse vs grosse

Shared letters: egos. Private to "gosse": -. Private to "grosse": r.

"gosse" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "grosse" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • gosseggosse · gose · goses · gsose · ogsse
  • grosseggrosse · gorsse · grose · groses · grrosse · grsose · rgosse

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "gosse" and "grosse" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ɡɔs\ versus \ɡʁos\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "gosse" or "grosse"?
"grosse" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #981 in our French list, against #4,492 for "gosse". 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 "gosse" and "grosse" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "gosse" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "grosse" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #428,922 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "gosse" and "grosse" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "gods vs gosse". 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 #428,922 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