Which to use
“passées” and “passés” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #5,057
- “passées” frequency rank
- #3,556
- “passés” frequency rank
- 8613
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | passées | passés |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Féminin pluriel de passé. | Masculin pluriel de passé. |
Same sound, different letters: passées vs passés
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. passées runs 7 letters (CVCCVVC) against passés's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Same sound, different spelling - passées / passés
This is the hard kind. passées and passés are pronounced identically (\pa.se\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8613, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
passées is recorded at frequency rank #5,057, classified as anadj, pronounced \pa.se\. passés is at rank #3,556, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pa.se\.
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 8613, this pair ranks #419,438 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of passées vs passés
Shared letters: apsé. Private to "passées": e. Private to "passés": -.
"passées" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC · "passés" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "passées" and "passés" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "passées" or "passés"?
What to do next
Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.
- Full dictionary entry for "passées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "passés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #419,438 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "passées" and "passés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pactes vs passés". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #419,438 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.