poséesvspoulesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#9,894
“posées” frequency rank
#7,882
“poules” frequency rank
17776
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature posées poules
Definition Pluriel de posée. Pluriel de poule.

Where the eye mixes posées and poules

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. posées (CVCVVC) and poules (CVVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

6 ch
posées
6 ch
poules

Visual trap between posées and poules

A purely visual mix-up. posées (\po.ze\) and poules (\pul\) 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 17776, 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\. poules is at rank #7,882, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pul\.

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 17776, this pair ranks #381,544 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of posées vs poules

Shared letters: eops. Private to "posées": é. Private to "poules": lu.

"posées" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC  ·  "poules" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • poules ← opules · polues · pouels · pouless · poulles · poulse · ppoules · puoles

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "posées" and "poules" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\po.ze\ versus \pul\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "posées" or "poules"?
"poules" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,882 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.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "posées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "poules" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #381,544 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "posées" and "poules" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "poilues vs poules". 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 #381,544 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