compliquéesvscompliquerWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: compliquées is a adjective, compliquer is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#13,757
“compliquées” frequency rank
#13,756
“compliquer” frequency rank
27513
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature compliquées compliquer
Definition Féminin pluriel de compliqué. Rendre confus ou difficile à comprendre.

Same sound, different letters: compliquées vs compliquer

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 9 letters. compliquées runs 11 letters (CVCCCVCVVVC) against compliquer's 10 (CVCCCVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

11 ch
compliquées
10 ch
compliquer

Homophone desk: compliquées vs compliquer

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: compliquées and compliquer carry the same recorded pronunciation, \kɔ̃.pli.ke\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 27513, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

compliquées is recorded at frequency rank #13,757, classified as anadj, pronounced \kɔ̃.pli.ke\. compliquer is at rank #13,756, tagged as averb, pronounced \kɔ̃.pli.ke\.

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 27513, this pair ranks #328,489 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of compliquées vs compliquer

Shared letters: ceilmopqu. Private to "compliquées": sé. Private to "compliquer": r.

"compliquées" · 11 letters · shape CVCCCVCVVVC  ·  "compliquer" · 10 letters · shape CVCCCVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • compliquer ← ccompliquer · cmopliquer · comlpiquer · commpliquer · compilquer · compliqeur · compliqquer · compliquerr

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "compliquées" and "compliquer" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "compliquées" is an adjective and "compliquer" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "compliquées" vs "compliquer" - which ranks higher?
"compliquer" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,756 in our French list, against #13,757 for "compliquées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

"compliquées" and "compliquer" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "compliquées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "compliquer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #328,489 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "compliquées" and "compliquer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "compliquées vs compliquent". 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 #328,489 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