Which to use
“pincée” is a noun and “pincer” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #29,080
- “pincée” frequency rank
- #30,739
- “pincer” frequency rank
- 59819
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pincée | pincer |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Ce qu’on peut prendre de certaines choses, en les pinçant entre deux ou trois doigts. | Serrer fortement avec une pince, avec des tenailles ou autres instruments semblables. |
Same sound, different letters: pincée vs pincer
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters.
Homophone desk: pincée vs pincer
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: pincée and pincer carry the same recorded pronunciation, \pɛ̃.se\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59819, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pincée is recorded at frequency rank #29,080, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɛ̃.se\. pincer is at rank #30,739, tagged as averb, pronounced \pɛ̃.se\.
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 59819, this pair ranks #101,023 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of pincée vs pincer
Shared letters: ceinp. Private to "pincée": é. Private to "pincer": r.
"pincée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV · "pincer" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- pincer ← ipncer · picner · pinccer · pincerr · pincre · pinecr · pinncer · pnicer
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "pincée" for "pincer" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "pincée" or "pincer" show up more?
After this comparison
"pincée" and "pincer" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "pincée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pincer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #101,023 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pincée" and "pincer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pillée vs pincée". 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 #101,023 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.