migrévsmisèreWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: migré is a verb, misère is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“migré” is a verb and “misère” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#37,924
“migré” frequency rank
#4,354
“misère” frequency rank
42278
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature migré misère
Definition Participe passé masculin singulier de migrer. Condition, état de celui qui inspire la pitié.

Where the eye mixes migré and misère

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. migré runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against misère's 6 (CVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
migré
6 ch
misère

Visual trap between migré and misère

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: migré is \mi.ɡʁe\ while misère is \mi.zɛʁ\. 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 noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 42278, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

migré is recorded at frequency rank #37,924, classified as averb, pronounced \mi.ɡʁe\. misère is at rank #4,354, tagged as anoun, pronounced \mi.zɛʁ\.

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 42278, this pair ranks #226,825 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of migré vs misère

Shared letters: imr. Private to "migré": gé. Private to "misère": esè.

"migré" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "misère" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "migré" for "misère" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "migré" is a verb and "misère" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "migré" vs "misère" - which ranks higher?
"misère" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,354 in our French list, against #37,924 for "migré". 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 "migré" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "misère" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #226,825 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "migré" and "misère" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "magret vs migré". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #226,825 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