poséesvspostesWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#9,894
“posées” frequency rank
#2,192
“postes” frequency rank
12086
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature posées postes
Definition Pluriel de posée. Pluriel de poste.

Where the eye mixes posées and postes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. posées (CVCVVC) and postes (CVCCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

6 ch
posées
6 ch
postes

Look-alike desk: posées vs postes

A purely visual mix-up. posées (\po.ze\) and postes (\pɔst\) 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 a single letter - é in “posées” becomes t in “postes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12086, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

posées is recorded at frequency rank #9,894, classified as anoun, pronounced \po.ze\. postes is at rank #2,192, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɔst\.

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 12086, this pair ranks #406,646 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of posées vs postes

Shared letters: eops. Private to "posées": é. Private to "postes": t.

"posées" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC  ·  "postes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • postes ← opstes · posets · posstes · postess · postse · posttes · potses · ppostes

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "posées" and "postes" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\po.ze\ versus \pɔst\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "posées" vs "postes" - which ranks higher?
"postes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,192 in our French list, against #9,894 for "posées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "posées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "postes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #406,646 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "posées" and "postes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "posées vs poseur". 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 #406,646 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