Which to use
“racine” is a noun and “ruiné” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #5,912
- “racine” frequency rank
- #13,469
- “ruiné” frequency rank
- 19381
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | racine | ruiné |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Organe végétal, généralement souterrain, assurant l’absorption de l’eau et des sels minéraux, la fixation de la plante à son support et parfois le stockage de réserves. Certaines racines peuvent être aériennes, aquatiques ou spécialisées. | Qui a perdu sa fortune. |
Where the eye mixes racine and ruiné
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: racine vs ruiné
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: racine is \ʁa.sin\ while ruiné is \ʁɥi.ne\. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19381, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
racine is recorded at frequency rank #5,912, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁa.sin\. ruiné is at rank #13,469, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʁɥi.ne\.
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 19381, this pair ranks #373,558 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of racine vs ruiné
Shared letters: inr. Private to "racine": ace. Private to "ruiné": ué.
"racine" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV · "ruiné" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- racine ← arcine · raccine · racien · racinne · racnie · raicne · rcaine · rracine
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "racine" and "ruiné" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "racine" or "ruiné" show up more?
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 "racine" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "ruiné" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #373,558 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "racine" and "ruiné" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ruiné vs Rune". 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 #373,558 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.