chantéevschasséeWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#24,513
“chantée” frequency rank
#34,929
“chassée” frequency rank
59442
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature chantée chassée
Definition Participe passé féminin singulier du verbe chanter. Féminin singulier de chassé.

Where the eye mixes chantée and chassée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. chantée and chassée follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCCVV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
chantée
7 ch
chassée

Visual trap between chantée and chassée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: chantée is \ʃɑ̃.te\ while chassée is \ʃa.se\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 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 59442, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

chantée is recorded at frequency rank #24,513, classified as averb, pronounced \ʃɑ̃.te\. chassée is at rank #34,929, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʃa.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 59442, this pair ranks #103,110 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of chantée vs chassée

Shared letters: acehé. Private to "chantée": nt. Private to "chassée": s.

"chantée" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVV  ·  "chassée" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "chantée" for "chassée" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "chantée" is a verb and "chassée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "chantée" vs "chassée" - which ranks higher?
"chantée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #24,513 in our French list, against #34,929 for "chassée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "chantée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "chassée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #103,110 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "chantée" and "chassée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "chassée vs chassées". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #103,110 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