Which to use
“hôtesse” and “housse” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #17,448
- “hôtesse” frequency rank
- #21,345
- “housse” frequency rank
- 38793
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | hôtesse | housse |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Femme qui reçoit dans sa demeure ou un lieu dont elle est responsable. | Sorte de couverture qu’on attache à la selle d’un cheval et qui couvre la croupe. |
Where the eye mixes hôtesse and housse
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. hôtesse runs 7 letters (CVCVCCV) against housse's 6 (CVVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between hôtesse and housse
A purely visual mix-up. hôtesse (^((h muet))\o.tɛs\) and housse (^((h aspiré))\us\) 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 38793, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
hôtesse is recorded at frequency rank #17,448, classified as anoun, pronounced ^((h muet))\o.tɛs\. housse is at rank #21,345, tagged as anoun, pronounced ^((h aspiré))\us\.
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 38793, this pair ranks #252,767 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of hôtesse vs housse
Shared letters: ehs. Private to "hôtesse": tô. Private to "housse": ou.
"hôtesse" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCV · "housse" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- housse ← hhousse · hosuse · houses · huosse · ohusse
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "hôtesse" and "housse" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "hôtesse" or "housse" show up more?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "hôtesse" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "housse" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #252,767 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "hôtesse" and "housse" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hissé vs housse". 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 #252,767 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.