coloréesvscolorisWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: colorées is a adjective, coloris is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“colorées” is an adjective and “coloris” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#17,382
“colorées” frequency rank
#12,130
“coloris” frequency rank
29512
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature colorées coloris
Definition Féminin pluriel de coloré. Effet qui résulte du mélange et de l’emploi des couleurs dans les tableaux.

Where the eye mixes colorées and coloris

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. colorées runs 8 letters (CVCVCVVC) against coloris's 7 (CVCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
colorées
7 ch
coloris

Visual trap between colorées and coloris

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: colorées is \kɔ.lɔ.ʁe\ while coloris is \kɔ.lɔ.ʁi\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29512, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

colorées is recorded at frequency rank #17,382, classified as anadj, pronounced \kɔ.lɔ.ʁe\. coloris is at rank #12,130, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔ.lɔ.ʁi\.

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 29512, this pair ranks #316,197 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of colorées vs coloris

Shared letters: clors. Private to "colorées": eé. Private to "coloris": i.

"colorées" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCVVC  ·  "coloris" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • coloris ← ccoloris · clooris · colloris · coloirs · coloriss · colorris · colorsi · colrois

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "colorées" for "coloris" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "colorées" is an adjective and "coloris" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "colorées" or "coloris" show up more?
"coloris" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,130 in our French list, against #17,382 for "colorées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "colorées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "coloris" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #316,197 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "colorées" and "coloris" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "colorées vs colorier". 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 #316,197 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