recouchervsretouchéeTell them apart

Which to use

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

#48,145
“recoucher” frequency rank
#48,160
“retouchée” frequency rank
96305
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature recoucher retouchée
Definition Coucher de nouveau ; remettre au lit. Participe passé féminin singulier de retoucher.

Where the eye mixes recoucher and retouchée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. recoucher (CVCVVCCVC) and retouchée (CVCVVCCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

9 ch
recoucher
9 ch
retouchée

Visual trap between recoucher and retouchée

A purely visual mix-up. recoucher (\ʁə.ku.ʃe\) and retouchée (\ʁə.tu.ʃe\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 96305, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

recoucher is recorded at frequency rank #48,145, classified as averb, pronounced \ʁə.ku.ʃe\. retouchée is at rank #48,160, tagged as averb, pronounced \ʁə.tu.ʃe\.

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 96305, this pair ranks #729 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of recoucher vs retouchée

Shared letters: cehoru. Private to "recoucher": -. Private to "retouchée": té.

"recoucher" · 9 letters · shape CVCVVCCVC  ·  "retouchée" · 9 letters · shape CVCVVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • recoucher ← ercoucher · rceoucher · reccoucher · recocuher · recouccher · recoucehr · recoucherr · recouchher

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "recoucher" and "retouchée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ʁə.ku.ʃe\ versus \ʁə.tu.ʃe\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "recoucher" or "retouchée" show up more?
"recoucher" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #48,145 in our French list, against #48,160 for "retouchée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "recoucher" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "retouchée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #729 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "recoucher" and "retouchée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "recoucher vs recracher". 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 #729 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