Which to use
“manquée” is an adjective and “masque” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #22,932
- “manquée” frequency rank
- #3,938
- “masque” frequency rank
- 26870
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | manquée | masque |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Féminin singulier de manqué. | Faux visage de carton ou d’autre matière, dont on se couvre la figure pour se déguiser, pour accomplir un rituel, dissimuler son identité ou bien par jeu. |
Where the eye mixes manquée and masque
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. manquée runs 7 letters (CVCCVVV) against masque's 6 (CVCCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses manquée with masque
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: manquée is \mɑ̃.ke\ while masque is \mask\. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26870, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
manquée is recorded at frequency rank #22,932, classified as anadj, pronounced \mɑ̃.ke\. masque is at rank #3,938, tagged as anoun, pronounced \mask\.
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 26870, this pair ranks #332,335 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of manquée vs masque
Shared letters: aemqu. Private to "manquée": né. Private to "masque": s.
"manquée" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVV · "masque" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- masque ← amsque · maqsue · masqeu · masqque · massque · masuqe · mmasque · msaque
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "manquée" and "masque" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "manquée" or "masque"?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "manquée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "masque" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #332,335 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "manquée" and "masque" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "manquée vs moquée". 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 #332,335 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.