Which to use
“était” is a verb and “étuis” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #64
- “était” frequency rank
- #47,703
- “étuis” frequency rank
- 47767
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | était | étuis |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Troisième personne du singulier de l’imparfait du verbe être. | Pluriel de étui. |
Where the eye mixes était and étuis
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. était and étuis follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Why the eye confuses était with étuis
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: était is \e.tɛ\ while étuis is \e.tɥi\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47767, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
était is recorded at frequency rank #64, classified as averb, pronounced \e.tɛ\. étuis is at rank #47,703, tagged as anoun, pronounced \e.tɥi\.
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 47767, this pair ranks #184,304 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of était vs étuis
Shared letters: ité. Private to "était": a. Private to "étuis": su.
"était" · 5 letters · shape VCVVC · "étuis" · 5 letters · shape VCVVC
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "était" and "étuis" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary French text, does "était" or "étuis" show up more?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "était" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "étuis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #184,304 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "était" and "étuis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "étai vs étuis". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #184,304 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.