butéevsbuttesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#46,043
“butée” frequency rank
#35,412
“buttes” frequency rank
81455
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature butée buttes
Definition Dispositif servant à délimiter la course d’une pièce mobile. Pluriel de butte.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set butée and buttes apart are highlighted. They share 4 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

5 ch
butée
6 ch
buttes

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. butée (\by.te\) and buttes (\byt\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 81455, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

butée is recorded at frequency rank #46,043, classified as anoun, pronounced \by.te\. buttes is at rank #35,412, tagged as anoun, pronounced \byt\.

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 81455, this pair ranks #18,711 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of butée vs buttes

Shared letters: betu. Private to "butée": é. Private to "buttes": s.

"butée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "buttes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • buttesbbuttes · btutes · butes · butets · buttess · buttse · ubttes

Frequency comparison

butée#46,043
buttes#35,412

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "butée" and "buttes" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\by.te\ versus \byt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "butée" or "buttes"?
"buttes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #35,412 in our French list, against #46,043 for "butée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering butée vs buttes

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 “butée” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list