nocevsnowTell them apart

Quick tell: noce is a noun, now is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“noce” is a noun and “now” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#25,752
“noce” frequency rank
#8,278
“now” frequency rank
34030
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature noce now
Definition Mariage. Maintenant.

Where the eye mixes noce and now

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

4 ch
noce
3 ch
now

Visual trap between noce and now

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: noce is \nɔs\ while now is \ˈnaʊ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 34030, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

noce is recorded at frequency rank #25,752, classified as anoun, pronounced \nɔs\. now is at rank #8,278, tagged as anadv, pronounced \ˈnaʊ\.

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 34030, this pair ranks #286,638 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of noce vs now

Shared letters: no. Private to "noce": ce. Private to "now": w.

"noce" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "now" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • nocencoe · nnoce · nocce · noec

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "noce" and "now" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "noce" is a noun and "now" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "noce" or "now"?
"now" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,278 in our French list, against #25,752 for "noce". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "noce" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "now" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #286,638 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "noce" and "now" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "noce vs noués". 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 #286,638 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