rancevsravieWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#22,060
“rance” frequency rank
#10,391
“ravie” frequency rank
32451
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature rance ravie
Definition Se dit des corps gras qui, laissés au contact de l’air, ont pris une odeur forte et un goût désagréable. Féminin singulier de ravi.

Where the eye mixes rance and ravie

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
rance
5 ch
ravie

Look-alike desk: rance vs ravie

A purely visual mix-up. rance (\ʁɑ̃s\) and ravie (\ʁa.vi\) 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 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 32451, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

rance is recorded at frequency rank #22,060, classified as anadj, pronounced \ʁɑ̃s\. ravie is at rank #10,391, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʁa.vi\.

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 32451, this pair ranks #297,197 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of rance vs ravie

Shared letters: aer. Private to "rance": cn. Private to "ravie": iv.

"rance" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "ravie" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • rancearnce · racne · rancce · ranec · rannce · rnace · rrance
  • raviearvie · raive · ravei · ravvie · rravie

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "rance" for "ravie" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ʁɑ̃s\ versus \ʁa.vi\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "rance" or "ravie"?
"ravie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,391 in our French list, against #22,060 for "rance". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "rance" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ravie" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #297,197 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "rance" and "ravie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rance vs rani". 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 #297,197 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