dépasse vs dépasses, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“dépasse” and “dépasses” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#3,401
“dépasse” frequency rank: #46,131
“dépasses” frequency rank: 49532
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	dépasse	dépasses
Definition	Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de dépasser.	Deuxième personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de dépasser.

Same sound, different letters: dépasse vs dépasses

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. dépasse runs 7 letters (CVCVCCV) against dépasses's 8 (CVCVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch

dépasse

8 ch

dépasses

Ear matches; page differs - dépasse and dépasses

This is the hard kind. dépasse and dépasses are pronounced identically (\de.pas\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “dépasse” sits inside “dépasses”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49532, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dépasse is recorded at frequency rank #3,401, classified as averb, pronounced \de.pas\. dépasses is at rank #46,131, tagged as averb, pronounced \de.pas\.

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 49532, this pair ranks #169,861 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dépasse vs dépasses

Shared letters: adepsé. Private to "dépasse": -. Private to "dépasses": -.

"dépasse" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCV · "dépasses" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "dépasse" and "dépasses" be used interchangeably?

No. They are pronounced the same (\de.pas\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.

Frequency check: "dépasse" vs "dépasses" - which ranks higher?

"dépasse" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,401 in our French list, against #46,131 for "dépasses". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

Full dictionary entry for "dépasse" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "dépasses" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #169,861 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"dépasse" and "dépasses" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dépassera vs dépasses". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #169,861 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.