habilléevshabillerWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#13,609
“habillée” frequency rank
#7,065
“habiller” frequency rank
20674
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature habillée habiller
Definition Féminin singulier de habillé. Mettre des habits à quelqu’un, le vêtir.

Same sound, different letters: habillée vs habiller

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. habillée (CVCVCCVV) and habiller (CVCVCCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

8 ch
habillée
8 ch
habiller

Ear matches; page differs - habillée and habiller

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: habillée and habiller carry the same recorded pronunciation, ^((h muet))\a.bi.je\. 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 20674, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

habillée is recorded at frequency rank #13,609, classified as anadj, pronounced ^((h muet))\a.bi.je\. habiller is at rank #7,065, tagged as averb, pronounced ^((h muet))\a.bi.je\.

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 20674, this pair ranks #367,090 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of habillée vs habiller

Shared letters: abehil. Private to "habillée": é. Private to "habiller": r.

"habillée" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVV  ·  "habiller" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • habiller ← ahbiller · habbiller · habilelr · habiler · habillerr · habillre · habliler · haibller

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "habillée" and "habiller" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "habillée" is an adjective and "habiller" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "habillée" or "habiller"?
"habiller" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,065 in our French list, against #13,609 for "habillée". 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 "habillée" / "habiller". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "habillée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "habiller" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #367,090 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "habillée" and "habiller" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "habillée vs habillez". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #367,090 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