badervsbaséeTell them apart

Quick tell: bader is a verb, basée is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#47,176
“bader” frequency rank
#4,126
“basée” frequency rank
51302
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bader basée
Definition Regarder bouche bée, c’est-à-dire la bouche ouverte, parfois avec étonnement ou admiration ; contempler avec admiration ou envie. Féminin singulier de basé.

Where the eye mixes bader and basée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
bader
5 ch
basée

Why the eye confuses bader with basée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: bader is \ba.de\ while basée is \ba.ze\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 51302, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bader is recorded at frequency rank #47,176, classified as averb, pronounced \ba.de\. basée is at rank #4,126, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ba.ze\.

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 51302, this pair ranks #156,067 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bader vs basée

Shared letters: abe. Private to "bader": dr. Private to "basée": .

"bader" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "basée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • baderabder · badder · baderr · baedr · bbader · bdaer

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "bader" and "basée" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "bader" is a verb and "basée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "bader" vs "basée" - which ranks higher?
"basée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,126 in our French list, against #47,176 for "bader". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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 "bader" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "basée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #156,067 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bader" and "basée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bader vs brider". 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 #156,067 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