absorbévsabsorbéesWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#16,793
“absorbé” frequency rank
#49,453
“absorbées” frequency rank
66246
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature absorbé absorbées
Definition Qualifie une personne profondément appliquée à quelque chose. Féminin pluriel de absorbé.

Same sound, different letters: absorbé vs absorbées

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters.

7 ch
absorbé
9 ch
absorbées

Same sound, different spelling - absorbé / absorbées

This is the hard kind. absorbé and absorbées are pronounced identically (\ap.sɔʁ.be\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “absorbé” sits inside “absorbées”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66246, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

absorbé is recorded at frequency rank #16,793, classified as anadj, pronounced \ap.sɔʁ.be\. absorbées is at rank #49,453, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ap.sɔʁ.be\.

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 66246, this pair ranks #68,634 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of absorbé vs absorbées

Shared letters: aborsé. Private to "absorbé": -. Private to "absorbées": e.

"absorbé" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCCV  ·  "absorbées" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCCVVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "absorbé" and "absorbées" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\ap.sɔʁ.be\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "absorbé" vs "absorbées" - which ranks higher?
"absorbé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,793 in our French list, against #49,453 for "absorbées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've separated the homophone pair "absorbé" / "absorbées". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "absorbé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "absorbées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #68,634 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "absorbé" and "absorbées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "absorbées vs absorbés". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #68,634 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