illustréesvsillustrerConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#29,811
“illustrées” frequency rank
#9,333
“illustrer” frequency rank
39144
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature illustrées illustrer
Definition Féminin pluriel de illustré. Rendre illustre.

Same sound, different letters: illustrées vs illustrer

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 8 letters.

10 ch
illustrées
9 ch
illustrer

Same sound, different spelling - illustrées / illustrer

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: illustrées and illustrer carry the same recorded pronunciation, \i.lys.tʁe\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39144, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

illustrées is recorded at frequency rank #29,811, classified as anadj, pronounced \i.lys.tʁe\. illustrer is at rank #9,333, tagged as averb, pronounced \i.lys.tʁe\.

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 39144, this pair ranks #250,172 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of illustrées vs illustrer

Shared letters: eilrstu. Private to "illustrées": é. Private to "illustrer": -.

"illustrées" · 10 letters · shape VCCVCCCVVC  ·  "illustrer" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • illustrerillsutrer · illusrter · illusstrer · illusterr · illustrerr · illustrrer · illusttrer · illutsrer

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "illustrées" and "illustrer" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "illustrées" is an adjective and "illustrer" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "illustrées" or "illustrer" show up more?
"illustrer" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,333 in our French list, against #29,811 for "illustrées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

"illustrées" and "illustrer" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "illustrées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "illustrer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #250,172 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "illustrées" and "illustrer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "illustrées vs illustrés". 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 #250,172 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