incarnevsincarnéeWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: incarne is a verb, incarnée is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#8,254
“incarne” frequency rank
#19,865
“incarnée” frequency rank
28119
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature incarne incarnée
Definition Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de incarner. Féminin singulier de incarné.

Where the eye mixes incarne and incarnée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. incarne runs 7 letters (VCCVCCV) against incarnée's 8 (VCCVCCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
incarne
8 ch
incarnée

Visual trap between incarne and incarnée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: incarne is \ɛ̃.kaʁn\ while incarnée is \ɛ̃.kaʁ.ne\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 28119, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

incarne is recorded at frequency rank #8,254, classified as averb, pronounced \ɛ̃.kaʁn\. incarnée is at rank #19,865, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ɛ̃.kaʁ.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 28119, this pair ranks #324,807 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of incarne vs incarnée

Shared letters: aceinr. Private to "incarne": -. Private to "incarnée": é.

"incarne" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCCV  ·  "incarnée" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • incarne ← icnarne · inacrne · incanre · incaren · incarnne · incarrne · inccarne · incrane

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "incarne" and "incarnée" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "incarne" is a verb and "incarnée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "incarne" or "incarnée"?
"incarne" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,254 in our French list, against #19,865 for "incarnée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "incarne" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "incarnée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #324,807 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "incarne" and "incarnée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Icare vs incarne". 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 #324,807 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