priéevsprivéeTell them apart

Quick tell: priée is a verb, privée is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“priée” is a verb and “privée” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,295
“priée” frequency rank
#1,535
“privée” frequency rank
50830
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature priée privée
Definition Participe passé féminin singulier de prier. Féminin singulier de privé.

Where the eye mixes priée and privée

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

5 ch
priée
6 ch
privée

Why the eye confuses priée with privée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: priée is \pʁi.je\ while privée is \pʁi.ve\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50830, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

priée is recorded at frequency rank #49,295, classified as averb, pronounced \pʁi.je\. privée is at rank #1,535, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pʁi.ve\.

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 50830, this pair ranks #159,615 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of priée vs privée

Shared letters: eipré. Private to "priée": -. Private to "privée": v.

"priée" · 5 letters · shape CCVVV  ·  "privée" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "priée" and "privée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "priée" is a verb and "privée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "priée" vs "privée" - which ranks higher?
"privée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,535 in our French list, against #49,295 for "priée". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "priée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "privée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #159,615 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "priée" and "privée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "prep vs priée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #159,615 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