arrêtéevsarrêteraWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: arrêtée is a adjective, arrêtera is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“arrêtée” is an adjective and “arrêtera” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#6,680
“arrêtée” frequency rank
#12,103
“arrêtera” frequency rank
18783
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature arrêtée arrêtera
Definition Féminin singulier de arrêté. Troisième personne du singulier du futur du verbe arrêter.

Where the eye mixes arrêtée and arrêtera

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. arrêtée runs 7 letters (VCCVCVV) against arrêtera's 8 (VCCVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
arrêtée
8 ch
arrêtera

Look-alike desk: arrêtée vs arrêtera

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: arrêtée is \a.ʁɛ.te\ while arrêtera is \a.ʁɛ.tə.ʁa\. 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 (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18783, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

arrêtée is recorded at frequency rank #6,680, classified as anadj, pronounced \a.ʁɛ.te\. arrêtera is at rank #12,103, tagged as averb, pronounced \a.ʁɛ.tə.ʁa\.

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 18783, this pair ranks #376,597 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of arrêtée vs arrêtera

Shared letters: aertê. Private to "arrêtée": é. Private to "arrêtera": -.

"arrêtée" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCVV  ·  "arrêtera" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "arrêtée" and "arrêtera" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "arrêtée" is an adjective and "arrêtera" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "arrêtée" or "arrêtera" show up more?
"arrêtée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,680 in our French list, against #12,103 for "arrêtera". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "arrêtée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "arrêtera" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #376,597 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "arrêtée" and "arrêtera" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "arrêtera vs arrêterais". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #376,597 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