prévuvsprévueTell them apart

Which to use

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

#1,401
“prévu” frequency rank
#3,561
“prévue” frequency rank
4962
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature prévu prévue
Definition Qui a été prévu, à quoi l’on s’attend. Féminin singulier de prévu.

Same sound, different letters: prévu vs prévue

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters.

5 ch
prévu
6 ch
prévue

Same sound, different spelling - prévu / prévue

This is the hard kind. prévu and prévue are pronounced identically (\pʁe.vy\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “prévu” sits inside “prévue”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4962, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

prévu is recorded at frequency rank #1,401, classified as anadj, pronounced \pʁe.vy\. prévue is at rank #3,561, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pʁe.vy\.

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 4962, this pair ranks #430,247 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of prévu vs prévue

Shared letters: pruvé. Private to "prévu": -. Private to "prévue": e.

"prévu" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "prévue" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "prévu" and "prévue" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\pʁe.vy\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "prévu" vs "prévue" - which ranks higher?
"prévu" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,401 in our French list, against #3,561 for "prévue". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "prévu" / "prévue". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "prévu" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "prévue" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #430,247 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "prévu" and "prévue" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "prep vs prévu". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #430,247 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