spammervsspasmesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#40,028
“spammer” frequency rank
#35,738
“spasmes” frequency rank
75766
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature spammer spasmes
Definition Personne qui envoie des spams. Pluriel de spasme.

Where the eye mixes spammer and spasmes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. spammer and spasmes follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
spammer
7 ch
spasmes

Visual trap between spammer and spasmes

A purely visual mix-up. spammer (\spa.mœʁ\) and spasmes (\spasm\) 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 75766, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

spammer is recorded at frequency rank #40,028, classified as anoun, pronounced \spa.mœʁ\. spasmes is at rank #35,738, tagged as anoun, pronounced \spasm\.

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 75766, this pair ranks #33,080 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of spammer vs spasmes

Shared letters: aemps. Private to "spammer": r. Private to "spasmes": -.

"spammer" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC  ·  "spasmes" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • spammer ← psammer · sapmmer · spamemr · spamer · spammerr · spammre · spmamer · sppammer
  • spasmes ← psasmes · sapsmes · spamses · spasems · spasmess · spasmmes · spasmse · spassmes

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "spammer" for "spasmes" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\spa.mœʁ\ versus \spasm\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "spammer" or "spasmes"?
"spasmes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #35,738 in our French list, against #40,028 for "spammer". 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 "spammer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "spasmes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #33,080 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "spammer" and "spasmes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Sommer vs spammer". 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 #33,080 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