permettevsperpétréConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#11,827
“permette” frequency rank
#29,076
“perpétré” frequency rank
40903
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature permette perpétré
Definition Première personne du singulier du présent du subjonctif de permettre. Participe passé masculin singulier de perpétrer.

Where the eye mixes permette and perpétré

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. permette and perpétré follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

8 ch
permette
8 ch
perpétré

Visual trap between permette and perpétré

A purely visual mix-up. permette (\pɛʁ.mɛt\) and perpétré (\pɛʁ.pe.tʁe\) 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 4 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40903, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

permette is recorded at frequency rank #11,827, classified as averb, pronounced \pɛʁ.mɛt\. perpétré is at rank #29,076, tagged as averb, pronounced \pɛʁ.pe.tʁe\.

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 40903, this pair ranks #237,032 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of permette vs perpétré

Shared letters: eprt. Private to "permette": m. Private to "perpétré": é.

"permette" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCCV  ·  "perpétré" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • permetteeprmette · pemrette · peremtte · permete · permetet · permmette · permtete · perrmette

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "permette" for "perpétré" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\pɛʁ.mɛt\ versus \pɛʁ.pe.tʁe\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "permette" or "perpétré"?
"permette" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,827 in our French list, against #29,076 for "perpétré". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "permette" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "perpétré" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #237,032 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "permette" and "perpétré" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "perpétré vs perpétrés". 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 #237,032 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