Which to use
“icon” and “icônes” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #38,845
- “icon” frequency rank
- #19,311
- “icônes” frequency rank
- 58156
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | icon | icônes |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Icône. | Pluriel de icône. |
Where the eye mixes icon and icônes
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. icon runs 4 letters (VCVC) against icônes's 6 (VCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses icon with icônes
A purely visual mix-up. icon (\ˈaɪ.kɒn\) and icônes (\i.kon\) 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 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58156, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
icon is recorded at frequency rank #38,845, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈaɪ.kɒn\. icônes is at rank #19,311, tagged as anoun, pronounced \i.kon\.
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 58156, this pair ranks #110,709 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of icon vs icônes
Shared letters: cin. Private to "icon": o. Private to "icônes": esô.
"icon" · 4 letters · shape VCVC · "icônes" · 6 letters · shape VCVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- icon ← iccon · icno · iconn · iocn
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "icon" for "icônes" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "icon" or "icônes" show up more?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "icon" and "icônes" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "icon" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "icônes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #110,709 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "icon" and "icônes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "icon vs Ilona". 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 #110,709 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.