raquettevsrequêteConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#20,256
“raquette” frequency rank
#6,021
“requête” frequency rank
26277
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature raquette requête
Definition Instrument dont on se sert pour jouer à la paume, au volant ou au tennis, et qui est fait d’un filet de cordes à boyau, tendues en long et en travers sur un cadre de bois recourbé en ovale et muni d’un manche. Demande écrite ou verbale ; prière.

Where the eye mixes raquette and requête

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. raquette runs 8 letters (CVCVVCCV) against requête's 7 (CVCVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
raquette
7 ch
requête

Why the eye confuses raquette with requête

A purely visual mix-up. raquette (\ʁa.kɛt\) and requête (\ʁə.kɛt\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26277, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

raquette is recorded at frequency rank #20,256, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁa.kɛt\. requête is at rank #6,021, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁə.kɛt\.

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 26277, this pair ranks #336,043 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of raquette vs requête

Shared letters: eqrtu. Private to "raquette": a. Private to "requête": ê.

"raquette" · 8 letters · shape CVCVVCCV  ·  "requête" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • raquettearquette · raqeutte · raqquette · raquete · raquetet · raqutete · rauqette · rqauette

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "raquette" for "requête" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ʁa.kɛt\ versus \ʁə.kɛt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "raquette" or "requête" show up more?
"requête" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,021 in our French list, against #20,256 for "raquette". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "raquette" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "requête" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #336,043 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "raquette" and "requête" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "raquette vs raquettes". 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 #336,043 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