peséevspoésieConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#33,826
“pesée” frequency rank
#3,160
“poésie” frequency rank
36986
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pesée poésie
Definition Action de peser. (Traditionnellement) Art de faire des ouvrages en vers.

Where the eye mixes pesée and poésie

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. pesée runs 5 letters (CVCVV) against poésie's 6 (CVVCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
pesée
6 ch
poésie

Visual trap between pesée and poésie

A purely visual mix-up. pesée (\pə.ze\) and poésie (\pɔ.e.zi\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36986, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pesée is recorded at frequency rank #33,826, classified as anoun, pronounced \pə.ze\. poésie is at rank #3,160, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɔ.e.zi\.

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 36986, this pair ranks #265,715 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pesée vs poésie

Shared letters: epsé. Private to "pesée": -. Private to "poésie": io.

"pesée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "poésie" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "pesée" for "poésie" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\pə.ze\ versus \pɔ.e.zi\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "pesée" vs "poésie" - which ranks higher?
"poésie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,160 in our French list, against #33,826 for "pesée". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pesée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "poésie" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #265,715 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pesée" and "poésie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "peep vs pesée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #265,715 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