notéesvsnoyéesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#30,719
“notées” frequency rank
#43,035
“noyées” frequency rank
73754
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature notées noyées
Definition Féminin pluriel de noté. Féminin pluriel de noyé.

Where the eye mixes notées and noyées

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. notées (CVCVVC) and noyées (CVVVVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

6 ch
notées
6 ch
noyées

Visual trap between notées and noyées

A purely visual mix-up. notées (\nɔ.te\) and noyées (\nwa.je\) 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 a single letter - t in “notées” becomes y in “noyées”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 73754, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

notées is recorded at frequency rank #30,719, classified as anadj, pronounced \nɔ.te\. noyées is at rank #43,035, tagged as anadj, pronounced \nwa.je\.

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 73754, this pair ranks #39,398 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of notées vs noyées

Shared letters: enosé. Private to "notées": t. Private to "noyées": y.

"notées" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC  ·  "noyées" · 6 letters · shape CVVVVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "notées" for "noyées" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\nɔ.te\ versus \nwa.je\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "notées" or "noyées"?
"notées" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #30,719 in our French list, against #43,035 for "noyées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "notées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "noyées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #39,398 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "notées" and "noyées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "noués vs noyées". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #39,398 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