Which to use
“pique” and “piqûre” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #5,061
- “pique” frequency rank
- #18,280
- “piqûre” frequency rank
- 23341
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pique | piqûre |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Sorte d’arme formée d’un long bois dont le bout est garni d’un fer plat et pointu. | Petite blessure que fait une chose ou un animal qui pique. |
Where the eye mixes pique and piqûre
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. pique runs 5 letters (CVCVV) against piqûre's 6 (CVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: pique vs piqûre
A purely visual mix-up. pique (\pik\) and piqûre (\pi.kyʁ\) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23341, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pique is recorded at frequency rank #5,061, classified as anoun, pronounced \pik\. piqûre is at rank #18,280, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pi.kyʁ\.
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 23341, this pair ranks #353,071 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of pique vs piqûre
Shared letters: eipq. Private to "pique": u. Private to "piqûre": rû.
"pique" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV · "piqûre" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- pique ← ipque · piqeu · piqque · piuqe · ppique · pqiue
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "pique" for "piqûre" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "pique" or "piqûre" show up more?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "pique" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "piqûre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #353,071 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pique" and "piqûre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "piqués vs piqûre". 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 #353,071 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.