activesvsarrivésConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#11,335
“actives” frequency rank
#3,735
“arrivés” frequency rank
15070
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature actives arrivés
Definition Féminin pluriel de actif. Masculin pluriel de arrivé.

Where the eye mixes actives and arrivés

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. actives and arrivés follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCCVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
actives
7 ch
arrivés

Look-alike desk: actives vs arrivés

A purely visual mix-up. actives (\ak.tiv\) and arrivés (\a.ʁi.ve\) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 15070, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

actives is recorded at frequency rank #11,335, classified as anadj, pronounced \ak.tiv\. arrivés is at rank #3,735, tagged as anadj, pronounced \a.ʁi.ve\.

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 15070, this pair ranks #393,985 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of actives vs arrivés

Shared letters: aisv. Private to "actives": cet. Private to "arrivés": ré.

"actives" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCVC  ·  "arrivés" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • actives ← acctives · acitves · actievs · activess · activse · activves · acttives · actvies

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "actives" and "arrivés" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ak.tiv\ versus \a.ʁi.ve\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "actives" vs "arrivés" - which ranks higher?
"arrivés" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,735 in our French list, against #11,335 for "actives". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "actives" and "arrivés" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "actives" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "arrivés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #393,985 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "actives" and "arrivés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "activées vs actives". 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 #393,985 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