tabacvstableConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#4,191
“tabac” frequency rank
#1,013
“table” frequency rank
5204
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tabac table
Definition Plante herbacée du genre botanique Nicotiana de la famille des Solanacées, originaire des Amériques, qui est cultivée pour ses grandes feuilles dont on extrait le tabac à fumer, priser ou à chiquer. Surface plane de bois, de pierre, de marbre, etc., posée sur un ou plusieurs pieds et qui sert à divers usages.

Where the eye mixes tabac and table

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

5 ch
tabac
5 ch
table

Why the eye confuses tabac with table

A purely visual mix-up. tabac (\ta.ba\) and table (\tabl\) 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 5204, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tabac is recorded at frequency rank #4,191, classified as anoun, pronounced \ta.ba\. table is at rank #1,013, tagged as anoun, pronounced \tabl\.

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 5204, this pair ranks #429,654 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tabac vs table

Shared letters: abt. Private to "tabac": c. Private to "table": el.

"tabac" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "table" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tabacatbac · taabc · tabacc · tabbac · tabca · tbaac · ttabac
  • tableatble · tabble · tabel · tablle · talbe · tbale · ttable

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "tabac" and "table" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ta.ba\ versus \tabl\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "tabac" or "table" show up more?
"table" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,013 in our French list, against #4,191 for "tabac". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "tabac" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "table" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #429,654 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tabac" and "table" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "table vs tableur". 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 #429,654 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