Which to use
“patte” and “pavée” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #10,206
- “patte” frequency rank
- #36,525
- “pavée” frequency rank
- 46731
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | patte | pavée |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Membre d’un animal quadrupède, d’un oiseau (à l’exception des oiseaux de proie), des arthropodes comme l’écrevisse, le homard, l’araignée, la mouche, etc. | Synonyme de digitale pourpre ou pourprée, Digitalis purpurea, plante de la famille des scrofulariacées. |
Where the eye mixes patte and pavée
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. patte (CVCCV) and pavée (CVCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Visual trap between patte and pavée
A purely visual mix-up. patte (\pat\) and pavée (\pa.ve\) 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 46731, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
patte is recorded at frequency rank #10,206, classified as anoun, pronounced \pat\. pavée is at rank #36,525, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pa.ve\.
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 46731, this pair ranks #192,577 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of patte vs pavée
Shared letters: aep. Private to "patte": t. Private to "pavée": vé.
"patte" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "pavée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- patte ← aptte · patet · ppatte · ptate
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "patte" and "pavée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "patte" vs "pavée" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "patte" and "pavée" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "patte" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pavée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #192,577 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "patte" and "pavée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pavée vs priée". 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 #192,577 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.