passée vs prisée, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#2,439
“passée” frequency rank: #28,698
“prisée” frequency rank: 31137
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	passée	prisée
Definition	Action de passer. Passage	Estimation faite d’une chose qui doit être vendue ou inventoriée.

Where the eye mixes passée and prisée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. passée (CVCCVV) and prisée (CCVCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

6 ch

passée

6 ch

prisée

Why the eye confuses passée with prisée

A purely visual mix-up. passée (\pa.se\) and prisée (\pʁi.ze\) 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 31137, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

passée is recorded at frequency rank #2,439, classified as anoun, pronounced \pa.se\. prisée is at rank #28,698, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pʁi.ze\.

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 31137, this pair ranks #305,718 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of passée vs prisée

Shared letters: epsé. Private to "passée": a. Private to "prisée": ir.

"passée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV · "prisée" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "passée" and "prisée" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No. They are said differently (\pa.se\ versus \pʁi.ze\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.

Which is more common, "passée" or "prisée"?

"passée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,439 in our French list, against #28,698 for "prisée". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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 "passée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "prisée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #305,718 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"passée" and "prisée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "priée vs prisée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #305,718 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.