neuronevsnévroseWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#41,925
“neurone” frequency rank
#37,451
“névrose” frequency rank
79376
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature neurone névrose
Definition Type de cellule différenciée composant, avec les cellules gliales, le tissu nerveux. Ces cellules sont excitables et excitatrices, et elles conduisent l’influx nerveux. Le neurone possède un axone et des dendrites. Trouble psychique engendrant une souffrance mentale dont le patient est conscient, contrairement à la psychose.

Where the eye mixes neurone and névrose

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. neurone (CVVCVCV) and névrose (CVCCVCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
neurone
7 ch
névrose

Visual trap between neurone and névrose

A purely visual mix-up. neurone (\nø.ʁɔn\) and névrose (\ne.vʁoz\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 79376, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

neurone is recorded at frequency rank #41,925, classified as anoun, pronounced \nø.ʁɔn\. névrose is at rank #37,451, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ne.vʁoz\.

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 79376, this pair ranks #23,457 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of neurone vs névrose

Shared letters: enor. Private to "neurone": u. Private to "névrose": své.

"neurone" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCV  ·  "névrose" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • neurone ← enurone · neruone · neuorne · neurnoe · neuroen · neuronne · neurrone · nneurone

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "neurone" and "névrose" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\nø.ʁɔn\ versus \ne.vʁoz\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "neurone" vs "névrose" - which ranks higher?
"névrose" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #37,451 in our French list, against #41,925 for "neurone". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "neurone" and "névrose" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "neurone" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "névrose" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #23,457 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "neurone" and "névrose" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nécrose vs neurone". 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 #23,457 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