Which to use
“cultiver” is a verb and “cultivés” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #10,854
- “cultiver” frequency rank
- #18,978
- “cultivés” frequency rank
- 29832
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | cultiver | cultivés |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Travailler une terre pour la rendre plus fertile et pour améliorer ses productions. | Masculin pluriel de l'adjectif cultivé. |
Same sound, different letters: cultiver vs cultivés
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. cultiver and cultivés follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Same sound, different spelling - cultiver / cultivés
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: cultiver and cultivés carry the same recorded pronunciation, \kyl.ti.ve\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is averb, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29832, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
cultiver is recorded at frequency rank #10,854, classified as averb, pronounced \kyl.ti.ve\. cultivés is at rank #18,978, tagged as anadj, pronounced \kyl.ti.ve\.
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 29832, this pair ranks #314,181 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of cultiver vs cultivés
Shared letters: ciltuv. Private to "cultiver": er. Private to "cultivés": sé.
"cultiver" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCVC · "cultivés" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- cultiver ← ccultiver · clutiver · culitver · culltiver · cultievr · cultiverr · cultivre · cultivver
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "cultiver" for "cultivés" ever safe?
Frequency check: "cultiver" vs "cultivés" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
"cultiver" and "cultivés" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "cultiver" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cultivés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #314,181 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "cultiver" and "cultivés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cultivent vs cultivés". 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 #314,181 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.