déroutevsdévouéWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: déroute is a noun, dévoué is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“déroute” is a noun and “dévoué” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#14,460
“déroute” frequency rank
#17,942
“dévoué” frequency rank
32402
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature déroute dévoué
Definition Fuite de troupes qui ont été défaites ou qui ont pris l’épouvante d’elles-mêmes. Qui est disposé à tout faire pour être utile ou agréable à quelqu’un.

Where the eye mixes déroute and dévoué

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

7 ch
déroute
6 ch
dévoué

Look-alike desk: déroute vs dévoué

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: déroute is \de.ʁut\ while dévoué is \de.vwe\. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 32402, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

déroute is recorded at frequency rank #14,460, classified as anoun, pronounced \de.ʁut\. dévoué is at rank #17,942, tagged as anadj, pronounced \de.vwe\.

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 32402, this pair ranks #297,536 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of déroute vs dévoué

Shared letters: doué. Private to "déroute": ert. Private to "dévoué": v.

"déroute" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCV  ·  "dévoué" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "déroute" for "dévoué" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "déroute" is a noun and "dévoué" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "déroute" or "dévoué" show up more?
"déroute" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,460 in our French list, against #17,942 for "dévoué". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "déroute" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "dévoué" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #297,536 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "déroute" and "dévoué" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Devaux vs dévoué". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #297,536 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