ratéesvsratezWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: ratées is a adjective, ratez is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#37,024
“ratées” frequency rank
#30,769
“ratez” frequency rank
67793
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ratées ratez
Definition Féminin pluriel de raté. Deuxième personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de rater.

Same sound, different letters: ratées vs ratez

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 4 letters. ratées runs 6 letters (CVCVVC) against ratez's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
ratées
5 ch
ratez

Homophone desk: ratées vs ratez

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: ratées and ratez carry the same recorded pronunciation, \ʁa.te\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67793, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ratées is recorded at frequency rank #37,024, classified as anadj, pronounced \ʁa.te\. ratez is at rank #30,769, tagged as averb, pronounced \ʁa.te\.

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 67793, this pair ranks #61,907 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ratées vs ratez

Shared letters: aert. Private to "ratées": sé. Private to "ratez": z.

"ratées" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC  ·  "ratez" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • ratez ← artez · raetz · ratezz · rattez · ratze · rratez · rtaez

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ratées" for "ratez" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ratées" is an adjective and "ratez" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "ratées" vs "ratez" - which ranks higher?
"ratez" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #30,769 in our French list, against #37,024 for "ratées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ratées" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ratez" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #61,907 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ratées" and "ratez" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "râles vs ratées". 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 #61,907 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