kangvskungTell them apart

Which to use

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

#27,495
“kang” frequency rank
#21,985
“kung” frequency rank
49480
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature kang kung
Definition Lit en briques chauffé de l’intérieur, au nord de la Chine. Roi.

Where the eye mixes kang and kung

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. kang and kung follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
kang
4 ch
kung

Visual trap between kang and kung

A purely visual mix-up. kang (\kɑ̃ŋ\) and kung (\kɵŋ\) 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 a single letter - a in “kang” becomes u in “kung”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49480, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

kang is recorded at frequency rank #27,495, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɑ̃ŋ\. kung is at rank #21,985, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɵŋ\.

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 49480, this pair ranks #170,292 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of kang vs kung

Shared letters: gkn. Private to "kang": a. Private to "kung": u.

"kang" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "kung" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • kang ← akng · kagn · kangg · kanng · kkang · knag
  • kung ← kkung · knug · kugn · kungg · kunng · ukng

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "kang" and "kung" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\kɑ̃ŋ\ versus \kɵŋ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "kang" or "kung" show up more?
"kung" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #21,985 in our French list, against #27,495 for "kang". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "kang" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "kung" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #170,292 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "kang" and "kung" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "kala vs kang". 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 #170,292 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