dépasséevsdépasseraConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#16,606
“dépassée” frequency rank
#33,236
“dépassera” frequency rank
49842
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dépassée dépassera
Definition Féminin singulier de dépassé. Troisième personne du singulier du futur de dépasser.

Where the eye mixes dépassée and dépassera

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. dépassée runs 8 letters (CVCVCCVV) against dépassera's 9 (CVCVCCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
dépassée
9 ch
dépassera

Look-alike desk: dépassée vs dépassera

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dépassée is \de.pa.se\ while dépassera is \de.pa.sə.ʁa\. 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 verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49842, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dépassée is recorded at frequency rank #16,606, classified as anadj, pronounced \de.pa.se\. dépassera is at rank #33,236, tagged as averb, pronounced \de.pa.sə.ʁa\.

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 49842, this pair ranks #167,469 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dépassée vs dépassera

Shared letters: adepsé. Private to "dépassée": -. Private to "dépassera": r.

"dépassée" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVV  ·  "dépassera" · 9 letters · shape CVCVCCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "dépassée" and "dépassera" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dépassée" is an adjective and "dépassera" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "dépassée" or "dépassera"?
"dépassée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,606 in our French list, against #33,236 for "dépassera". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "dépassée" and "dépassera" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dépassée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "dépassera" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #167,469 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dépassée" and "dépassera" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dépassera vs dépasserait". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #167,469 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