Which to use
“ratée” is a noun and “rayé” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #15,989
- “ratée” frequency rank
- #16,981
- “rayé” frequency rank
- 32970
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ratée | rayé |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Femme qui n’a pas réussi dans une entreprise, dans une démarche, dans sa vie, etc. | Qui a des raies. |
Where the eye mixes ratée and rayé
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: ratée vs rayé
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ratée is \ʁa.te\ while rayé is \ʁɛ.je\. 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 32970, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ratée is recorded at frequency rank #15,989, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁa.te\. rayé is at rank #16,981, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʁɛ.je\.
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 32970, this pair ranks #293,739 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of ratée vs rayé
Shared letters: aré. Private to "ratée": et. Private to "rayé": y.
"ratée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV · "rayé" · 4 letters · shape CVVV
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "ratée" and "rayé" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "ratée" or "rayé" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "ratée" and "rayé" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "ratée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "rayé" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #293,739 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ratée" and "rayé" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rayé vs roya". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #293,739 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.