paréevspauseWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#35,632
“parée” frequency rank
#2,730
“pause” frequency rank
38362
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature parée pause
Definition Partie d'un fourneau de forge. Suspension ou interruption momentanée d’une action.

Where the eye mixes parée and pause

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
parée
5 ch
pause

Visual trap between parée and pause

A purely visual mix-up. parée (\pa.ʁe\) and pause (\poz\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38362, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

parée is recorded at frequency rank #35,632, classified as anoun, pronounced \pa.ʁe\. pause is at rank #2,730, tagged as anoun, pronounced \poz\.

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 38362, this pair ranks #255,791 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of parée vs pause

Shared letters: aep. Private to "parée": . Private to "pause": su.

"parée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "pause" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pauseapuse · pasue · paues · pausse · ppause · puase

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "parée" and "pause" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\pa.ʁe\ versus \poz\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "parée" or "pause"?
"pause" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,730 in our French list, against #35,632 for "parée". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "parée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pause" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #255,791 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "parée" and "pause" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "parée vs prep". 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 #255,791 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