grossevsgrosseurTell them apart

Which to use

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

#981
“grosse” frequency rank
#29,372
“grosseur” frequency rank
30353
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature grosse grosseur
Definition Une douzaine de douzaines. État de ce qui est gros.

Where the eye mixes grosse and grosseur

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence.

6 ch
grosse
8 ch
grosseur

Visual trap between grosse and grosseur

A purely visual mix-up. grosse (\ɡʁos\) and grosseur (\ɡʁɔ.sœʁ\) 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 2 extra letter(s) - “grosse” sits inside “grosseur”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 30353, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

grosse is recorded at frequency rank #981, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɡʁos\. grosseur is at rank #29,372, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɡʁɔ.sœʁ\.

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 30353, this pair ranks #310,906 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of grosse vs grosseur

Shared letters: egors. Private to "grosse": -. Private to "grosseur": u.

"grosse" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV  ·  "grosseur" · 8 letters · shape CCVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • grosseggrosse · gorsse · grose · groses · grrosse · grsose · rgosse
  • grosseurggrosseur · gorsseur · grosesur · groseur · grosseru · grosseurr · grossuer · grrosseur

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "grosse" and "grosseur" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ɡʁos\ versus \ɡʁɔ.sœʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "grosse" or "grosseur"?
"grosse" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #981 in our French list, against #29,372 for "grosseur". 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 "grosse" and "grosseur" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "grosse" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "grosseur" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #310,906 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "grosse" and "grosseur" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "grosse vs grossis". 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 #310,906 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