Which to use
“coudre” is a verb and “coulée” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #18,451
- “coudre” frequency rank
- #18,972
- “coulée” frequency rank
- 37423
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | coudre | coulée |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Assembler deux ou plusieurs objets avec un fil passé dans une aiguille ou un autre instrument semblable. | Action de s’écouler ; résultat de cette action. |
Where the eye mixes coudre and coulée
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: coudre vs coulée
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: coudre is \kudʁ\ while coulée is \ku.le\. 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 noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37423, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
coudre is recorded at frequency rank #18,451, classified as averb, pronounced \kudʁ\. coulée is at rank #18,972, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ku.le\.
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 37423, this pair ranks #262,621 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of coudre vs coulée
Shared letters: ceou. Private to "coudre": dr. Private to "coulée": lé.
"coudre" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV · "coulée" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- coudre ← ccoudre · codure · couddre · couder · coudrre · courde · cuodre · ocudre
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "coudre" and "coulée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "coudre" or "coulée" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "coudre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "coulée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #262,621 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "coudre" and "coulée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "conde vs coudre". 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 #262,621 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.