Which to use
“protégé” and “protégées” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #5,172
- “protégé” frequency rank
- #11,277
- “protégées” frequency rank
- 16449
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | protégé | protégées |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | En parlant des choses, mis à l’abri. | Féminin pluriel de protégé. |
Same sound, different letters: protégé vs protégées
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. protégé runs 7 letters (CCVCVCV) against protégées's 9 (CCVCVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Same sound, different spelling - protégé / protégées
This is the hard kind. protégé and protégées are pronounced identically (\pʁɔ.te.ʒe\) 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 2 extra letter(s) - “protégé” sits inside “protégées”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16449, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
protégé is recorded at frequency rank #5,172, classified as anadj, pronounced \pʁɔ.te.ʒe\. protégées is at rank #11,277, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pʁɔ.te.ʒe\.
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 16449, this pair ranks #387,794 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of protégé vs protégées
Shared letters: goprté. Private to "protégé": -. Private to "protégées": es.
"protégé" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCV · "protégées" · 9 letters · shape CCVCVCVVC
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "protégé" and "protégées" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "protégé" or "protégées"?
Useful next steps
Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.
- Full dictionary entry for "protégé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "protégées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #387,794 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "protégé" and "protégées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "protégées vs protégeons". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #387,794 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.