Which to use
“écouter” and “écoutez” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,646
- “écouter” frequency rank
- #5,717
- “écoutez” frequency rank
- 7363
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | écouter | écoutez |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Faire attention, prêter l’oreille pour entendre. | Deuxième personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de écouter. |
Same sound, different letters: écouter vs écoutez
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters.
Ear matches; page differs - écouter and écoutez
This is the hard kind. écouter and écoutez are pronounced identically (\e.ku.te\) 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 a single letter - r in “écouter” becomes z in “écoutez”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7363, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
écouter is recorded at frequency rank #1,646, classified as averb, pronounced \e.ku.te\. écoutez is at rank #5,717, tagged as averb, pronounced \e.ku.te\.
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 7363, this pair ranks #423,386 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of écouter vs écoutez
Shared letters: ceotué. Private to "écouter": r. Private to "écoutez": z.
"écouter" · 7 letters · shape VCVVCVC · "écoutez" · 7 letters · shape VCVVCVC
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "écouter" for "écoutez" ever safe?
Which is more common, "écouter" or "écoutez"?
What to do next
You've separated the homophone pair "écouter" / "écoutez". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "écouter" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "écoutez" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #423,386 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "écouter" and "écoutez" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "écoutées vs écoutez". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #423,386 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.