perdevsPerséeWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: perde is a verb, Persée is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“perde” is a verb and “Persée” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,654
“perde” frequency rank
#37,476
“Persée” frequency rank
51130
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perde Persée
Definition Première personne du singulier du présent du subjonctif de perdre. Sauveur d’Andromède, fille de Céphée et Cassiopée.

Where the eye mixes perde and Persée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
perde
6 ch
Persée

Why the eye confuses perde with Persée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: perde is \pɛʁd\ while Persée is \pɛʁ.se\. 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 name), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 51130, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perde is recorded at frequency rank #13,654, classified as averb, pronounced \pɛʁd\. Persée is at rank #37,476, tagged as aname, pronounced \pɛʁ.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 51130, this pair ranks #157,353 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of perde vs Persée

Shared letters: epr. Private to "perde": d. Private to "Persée": .

"perde" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "Persée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • perdeeprde · pedre · perdde · pered · pperde · prede

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "perde" for "Persée" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "perde" is a verb and "Persée" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "perde" vs "Persée" - which ranks higher?
"perde" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,654 in our French list, against #37,476 for "Persée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "perde" and "Persée" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "perde" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Persée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #157,353 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perde" and "Persée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Persée 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 #157,353 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