Which to use
“arrêta” is a verb and “arrêté” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #20,359
- “arrêta” frequency rank
- #1,018
- “arrêté” frequency rank
- 21377
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | arrêta | arrêté |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Troisième personne du singulier du passé simple du verbe arrêter. | Qui est immobile, immuable. |
Where the eye mixes arrêta and arrêté
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between arrêta and arrêté
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: arrêta is \a.ʁɛ.ta\ while arrêté is \a.ʁɛ.te\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - a in “arrêta” becomes é in “arrêté”, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 21377, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
arrêta is recorded at frequency rank #20,359, classified as averb, pronounced \a.ʁɛ.ta\. arrêté is at rank #1,018, tagged as anadj, pronounced \a.ʁɛ.te\.
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 21377, this pair ranks #363,479 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of arrêta vs arrêté
Shared letters: artê. Private to "arrêta": -. Private to "arrêté": é.
"arrêta" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV · "arrêté" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "arrêta" and "arrêté" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "arrêta" or "arrêté" show up more?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "arrêta" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "arrêté" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #363,479 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "arrêta" and "arrêté" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "arrêta vs arrêtais". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #363,479 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.