jongvsJoséWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: jong is a adjective, José is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“jong” is an adjective and “José” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,414
“jong” frequency rank
#5,575
“José” frequency rank
18989
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature jong José
Definition Jeune. Prénom masculin.

Where the eye mixes jong and José

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
jong
4 ch
José

Look-alike desk: jong vs José

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: jong is \joŋ\ while José is \ʒo.ze\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs name), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18989, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

jong is recorded at frequency rank #13,414, classified as anadj, pronounced \joŋ\. José is at rank #5,575, tagged as aname, pronounced \ʒo.ze\.

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 18989, this pair ranks #375,590 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of jong vs José

Shared letters: jo. Private to "jong": gn. Private to "José": .

"jong" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "José" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • jongjjong · jnog · jogn · jongg · jonng · ojng

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "jong" and "José" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "jong" is an adjective and "José" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "jong" or "José"?
"José" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,575 in our French list, against #13,414 for "jong". 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 "jong" and "José" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "jong" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "José" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #375,590 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "jong" and "José" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "jong vs jor". 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 #375,590 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