programmevsprogramméeWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: programme is a noun, programmée is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“programme” is a noun and “programmée” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#560
“programme” frequency rank
#13,874
“programmée” frequency rank
14434
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature programme programmée
Definition Écrit donnant le détail d’un événement ou d'une succession d'événements. Féminin singulier de programmé.

Where the eye mixes programme and programmée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence.

9 ch
programme
10 ch
programmée

Visual trap between programme and programmée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: programme is \pʁɔ.ɡʁam\ while programmée is \pʁɔ.ɡʁa.me\. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 14434, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

programme is recorded at frequency rank #560, classified as anoun, pronounced \pʁɔ.ɡʁam\. programmée is at rank #13,874, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pʁɔ.ɡʁa.me\.

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 14434, this pair ranks #396,670 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of programme vs programmée

Shared letters: aegmopr. Private to "programme": -. Private to "programmée": é.

"programme" · 9 letters · shape CCVCCVCCV  ·  "programmée" · 10 letters · shape CCVCCVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • programmeporgramme · pprogramme · prgoramme · progarmme · proggramme · programe · programem · progrmame

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "programme" and "programmée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "programme" is a noun and "programmée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "programme" vs "programmée" - which ranks higher?
"programme" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #560 in our French list, against #13,874 for "programmée". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "programme" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "programmée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #396,670 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "programme" and "programmée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "programmée vs programmées". 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 #396,670 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