portéesvsprêtéesWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#7,881
“portées” frequency rank
#47,543
“prêtées” frequency rank
55424
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature portées prêtées
Definition Féminin pluriel de porté. Féminin pluriel de prêté.

Where the eye mixes portées and prêtées

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. portées (CVCCVVC) and prêtées (CCVCVVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
portées
7 ch
prêtées

Why the eye confuses portées with prêtées

A purely visual mix-up. portées (\pɔʁ.te\) and prêtées (\pʁɛ.te\) 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 55424, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

portées is recorded at frequency rank #7,881, classified as anadj, pronounced \pɔʁ.te\. prêtées is at rank #47,543, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pʁɛ.te\.

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 55424, this pair ranks #127,529 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of portées vs prêtées

Shared letters: eprsté. Private to "portées": o. Private to "prêtées": ê.

"portées" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC  ·  "prêtées" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "portées" for "prêtées" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\pɔʁ.te\ versus \pʁɛ.te\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "portées" vs "prêtées" - which ranks higher?
"portées" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,881 in our French list, against #47,543 for "prêtées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "portées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "prêtées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #127,529 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "portées" and "prêtées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pètes vs prêtées". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #127,529 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