Which to use
“censé” and “censées” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #3,595
- “censé” frequency rank
- #20,384
- “censées” frequency rank
- 23979
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | censé | censées |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Supposé, réputé, considéré (comme). | Féminin pluriel de censé. |
Same sound, different letters: censé vs censées
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. censé runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against censées's 7 (CVCCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Ear matches; page differs - censé and censées
This is the hard kind. censé and censées are pronounced identically (\sɑ̃.se\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “censé” sits inside “censées”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23979, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
censé is recorded at frequency rank #3,595, classified as anadj, pronounced \sɑ̃.se\. censées is at rank #20,384, tagged as anadj, pronounced \sɑ̃.se\.
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 23979, this pair ranks #349,349 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of censé vs censées
Shared letters: censé. Private to "censé": -. Private to "censées": -.
"censé" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "censées" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "censé" for "censées" ever safe?
Which is more common, "censé" or "censées"?
What to do next
You've separated the homophone pair "censé" / "censées". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "censé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "censées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #349,349 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "censé" and "censées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "censées vs centers". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #349,349 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.