partesvspayésTell them apart

Quick tell: partes is a verb, payés is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“partes” is a verb and “payés” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#35,195
“partes” frequency rank
#5,591
“payés” frequency rank
40786
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature partes payés
Definition De partir. Masculin pluriel de payé.

Where the eye mixes partes and payés

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

6 ch
partes
5 ch
payés

Look-alike desk: partes vs payés

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: partes is \paʁt\ while payés is \pɛ.je\. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40786, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

partes is recorded at frequency rank #35,195, classified as averb, pronounced \paʁt\. payés is at rank #5,591, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pɛ.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 40786, this pair ranks #237,902 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of partes vs payés

Shared letters: aps. Private to "partes": ert. Private to "payés": .

"partes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "payés" · 5 letters · shape CVVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • partesaprtes · parets · parrtes · partess · partse · parttes · patres · ppartes

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "partes" and "payés" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "partes" is a verb and "payés" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "partes" or "payés"?
"payés" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,591 in our French list, against #35,195 for "partes". 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 "partes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "payés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #237,902 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "partes" and "payés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "partes vs pètes". 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 #237,902 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