beauté vs beautés, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#1,469
“beauté” frequency rank: #15,813
“beautés” frequency rank: 17282
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	beauté	beautés
Definition	Qualité de ce qui est beau, de ce qui est esthétique à la perception.	Pluriel de beauté.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set beauté and beautés apart are highlighted. They share 6 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

6 ch

beauté

7 ch

beautés

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

This is the hard kind. beauté and beautés are pronounced identically (\bo.te\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “beauté” sits inside “beautés”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17282, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

beauté is recorded at frequency rank #1,469, classified as anoun, pronounced \bo.te\. beautés is at rank #15,813, tagged as anoun, pronounced \bo.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 17282, this pair ranks #383,920 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of beauté vs beautés

Shared letters: abetué. Private to "beauté": -. Private to "beautés": s.

"beauté" · 6 letters · shape CVVVCV · "beautés" · 7 letters · shape CVVVCVC

Frequency comparison

beauté#1,469

beautés#15,813

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "beauté" and "beautés" be used interchangeably?

No. They are pronounced the same (\bo.te\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.

Which is more common, "beauté" or "beautés"?

"beauté" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,469 in our French list, against #15,813 for "beautés". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Remembering beauté vs beautés

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

Read both glosses above and match the meaning you intend, only context separates this pair.
See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “beauté” entry
Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable