étonnéevsétonnezTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#17,603
“étonnée” frequency rank
#41,614
“étonnez” frequency rank
59217
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature étonnée étonnez
Definition Féminin singulier de étonné. Deuxième personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de étonner.

Same sound, different letters: étonnée vs étonnez

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. étonnée (VCVCCVV) and étonnez (VCVCCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
étonnée
7 ch
étonnez

Ear matches; page differs - étonnée and étonnez

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: étonnée and étonnez carry the same recorded pronunciation, \e.tɔ.ne\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59217, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

étonnée is recorded at frequency rank #17,603, classified as anadj, pronounced \e.tɔ.ne\. étonnez is at rank #41,614, tagged as averb, pronounced \e.tɔ.ne\.

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 59217, this pair ranks #104,406 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of étonnée vs étonnez

Shared letters: enoté. Private to "étonnée": -. Private to "étonnez": z.

"étonnée" · 7 letters · shape VCVCCVV  ·  "étonnez" · 7 letters · shape VCVCCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "étonnée" and "étonnez" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "étonnée" is an adjective and "étonnez" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "étonnée" vs "étonnez" - which ranks higher?
"étonnée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,603 in our French list, against #41,614 for "étonnez". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "étonnée" / "étonnez". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "étonnée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "étonnez" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #104,406 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "étonnée" and "étonnez" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "étonnera vs étonnez". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #104,406 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