partievspatineWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#160
“partie” frequency rank
#30,301
“patine” frequency rank
30461
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature partie patine
Definition Portion d’un tout, morceau d’un ensemble. Vert-de-gris se formant sur les objets en cuivre ou en bronze.

Where the eye mixes partie and patine

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

6 ch
partie
6 ch
patine

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. partie (\paʁ.ti\) and patine (\pa.tin\) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 30461, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

partie is recorded at frequency rank #160, classified as anoun, pronounced \paʁ.ti\. patine is at rank #30,301, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pa.tin\.

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 30461, this pair ranks #310,163 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of partie vs patine

Shared letters: aeipt. Private to "partie": r. Private to "patine": n.

"partie" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "patine" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • partieaprtie · parite · parrtie · partei · parttie · ppartie · pratie
  • patineaptine · paitne · patien · patinne · patnie · pattine · ppatine · ptaine

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "partie" and "patine" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\paʁ.ti\ versus \pa.tin\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "partie" or "patine"?
"partie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #160 in our French list, against #30,301 for "patine". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list