annéevsannuléWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: année is a noun, annulé is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“année” is a noun and “annulé” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#173
“année” frequency rank
#6,364
“annulé” frequency rank
6537
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature année annulé
Definition Subdivision du temps, correspondant à la durée d’une révolution de la Terre autour du Soleil, qui comporte 365 jours (ou 366 jours dans l’année bissextile), 52 semaines environ, 12 mois solaires. Qui a pris une valeur nulle.

Where the eye mixes année and annulé

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. année runs 5 letters (VCCVV) against annulé's 6 (VCCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
année
6 ch
annulé

Look-alike desk: année vs annulé

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: année is \a.ne\ while annulé is \a.ny.le\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 6537, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

année is recorded at frequency rank #173, classified as anoun, pronounced \a.ne\. annulé is at rank #6,364, tagged as anadj, pronounced \a.ny.le\.

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 6537, this pair ranks #425,949 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of année vs annulé

Shared letters: ané. Private to "année": e. Private to "annulé": lu.

"année" · 5 letters · shape VCCVV  ·  "annulé" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "année" and "annulé" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "année" is a noun and "annulé" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "année" vs "annulé" - which ranks higher?
"année" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #173 in our French list, against #6,364 for "annulé". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "année" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "annulé" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #425,949 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "année" and "annulé" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "adulé vs annulé". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #425,949 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