recoinvsricainWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#39,007
“recoin” frequency rank
#33,871
“ricain” frequency rank
72878
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature recoin ricain
Definition Coin plus caché, moins en vue. Anglais américain, américain (langue).

Where the eye mixes recoin and ricain

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. recoin and ricain follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
recoin
6 ch
ricain

Why the eye confuses recoin with ricain

A purely visual mix-up. recoin (\ʁə.kwɛ̃\) and ricain (\ʁi.kɛ̃\) 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 72878, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

recoin is recorded at frequency rank #39,007, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁə.kwɛ̃\. ricain is at rank #33,871, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁi.kɛ̃\.

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 72878, this pair ranks #42,440 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of recoin vs ricain

Shared letters: cinr. Private to "recoin": eo. Private to "ricain": a.

"recoin" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC  ·  "ricain" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • recoinercoin · rceoin · reccoin · recion · recoinn · reconi · reocin · rrecoin
  • ricainircain · rciain · riacin · ricainn · ricani · riccain · rician · rricain

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "recoin" for "ricain" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ʁə.kwɛ̃\ versus \ʁi.kɛ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "recoin" vs "ricain" - which ranks higher?
"ricain" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #33,871 in our French list, against #39,007 for "recoin". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "recoin" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ricain" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #42,440 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "recoin" and "ricain" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "recoin vs revoie". 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 #42,440 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