installevsinstalléesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“installe” and “installées” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#5,255
“installe” frequency rank
#12,178
“installées” frequency rank
17433
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature installe installées
Definition Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de installer. Participe passé féminin pluriel de installer.

Where the eye mixes installe and installées

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 8 letters in sequence. installe runs 8 letters (VCCCVCCV) against installées's 10 (VCCCVCCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
installe
10 ch
installées

Visual trap between installe and installées

A purely visual mix-up. installe (\ɛ̃s.tal\) and installées (\ɛ̃s.ta.le\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17433, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

installe is recorded at frequency rank #5,255, classified as averb, pronounced \ɛ̃s.tal\. installées is at rank #12,178, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɛ̃s.ta.le\.

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 17433, this pair ranks #383,190 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of installe vs installées

Shared letters: aeilnst. Private to "installe": -. Private to "installées": é.

"installe" · 8 letters · shape VCCCVCCV  ·  "installées" · 10 letters · shape VCCCVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • installe ← innstalle · insatlle · insstalle · instale · instalel · instlale · insttalle · intsalle

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "installe" and "installées" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\ɛ̃s.tal\ versus \ɛ̃s.ta.le\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "installe" or "installées"?
"installe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,255 in our French list, against #12,178 for "installées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "installe" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "installées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #383,190 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "installe" and "installées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "installées vs installes". 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 #383,190 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