Which to use
“marée” is a noun and “marié” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #8,269
- “marée” frequency rank
- #3,937
- “marié” frequency rank
- 12206
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | marée | marié |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Mouvement d’ondulation de la surface de la mer, provoquant une baisse et une hausse de son niveau sur un rythme journalier ou semi-journalier selon les régions du globe. | Qui s’est marié ; qui a un époux ou une épouse. |
Where the eye mixes marée and marié
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. marée and marié follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Visual trap between marée and marié
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: marée is \ma.ʁe\ while marié is \ma.ʁje\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12206, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
marée is recorded at frequency rank #8,269, classified as anoun, pronounced \ma.ʁe\. marié is at rank #3,937, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ma.ʁje\.
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 12206, this pair ranks #406,174 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of marée vs marié
Shared letters: amré. Private to "marée": e. Private to "marié": i.
"marée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV · "marié" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "marée" for "marié" ever safe?
Frequency check: "marée" vs "marié" - which ranks higher?
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 "marée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "marié" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #406,174 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "marée" and "marié" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "majorée vs marée". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #406,174 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.