Which to use
“tête” is a noun and “tice” is a preposition - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #237
- “tête” frequency rank
- #45,913
- “tice” frequency rank
- 46150
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | tête | tice |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Partie supérieure du corps, qui est le siège du cerveau et des principaux organes des sens, et qui, chez l’être humain et chez la plupart des vertébrés, tient au reste du corps par le cou. | En haut de, au sommet de (sans mouvement). |
Where the eye mixes tête and tice
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. tête and tice follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: tête vs tice
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: tête is \tɛt\ while tice is \ˈtiʃɛ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs preposition), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46150, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
tête is recorded at frequency rank #237, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɛt\. tice is at rank #45,913, tagged as aprep, pronounced \ˈtiʃɛ\.
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 46150, this pair ranks #197,206 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of tête vs tice
Shared letters: et. Private to "tête": ê. Private to "tice": ci.
"tête" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "tice" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- tice ← itce · tcie · ticce · tiec · ttice
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "tête" and "tice" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "tête" or "tice"?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "tête" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "tice" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #197,206 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "tête" and "tice" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tice vs tif". 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 #197,206 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.