actevsatConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#1,353
“acte” frequency rank
#4,122
“at” frequency rank
5475
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature acte at
Definition Résultat d’une action, opération accomplie. Ancien nom de l’attier, qui a peut-être été importé à la Réunion par les Malbars et les Tamouls ; ce nom était particulièrement fréquent au Sénégal.

Where the eye mixes acte and at

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
acte
2 ch
at

Why the eye confuses acte with at

A purely visual mix-up. acte (\akt\) and at (\at\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5475, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

acte is recorded at frequency rank #1,353, classified as anoun, pronounced \akt\. at is at rank #4,122, tagged as anoun, pronounced \at\.

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 5475, this pair ranks #428,917 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of acte vs at

Shared letters: at. Private to "acte": ce. Private to "at": -.

"acte" · 4 letters · shape VCCV  ·  "at" · 2 letters · shape VC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • acteaccte · acet · actte · atce · cate

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "acte" and "at" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\akt\ versus \at\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "acte" or "at"?
"acte" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,353 in our French list, against #4,122 for "at". 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 "acte" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "at" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #428,917 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "acte" and "at" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "at vs aur". 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 #428,917 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