reculévsreculéesWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: reculé is a adjective, reculées is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“reculé” is an adjective and “reculées” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#16,720
“reculé” frequency rank
#37,515
“reculées” frequency rank
54235
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature reculé reculées
Definition Qui est éloigné, lointain. Pluriel de reculée.

Letter map: reculé vs reculées

Shared letters muted; letters that set reculé and reculées apart highlighted. Shared run: 6. reculé runs 6 letters (CVCVCV) against reculées's 8 (CVCVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
reculé
8 ch
reculées

Role in the sentence - reculé and reculées

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: reculé is anadjective and reculéesanoun. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “reculé” sits inside “reculées”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 54235, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

reculé is recorded at frequency rank #16,720, classified as anadj. reculées is at rank #37,515, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁə.ky.le\.

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 54235, this pair ranks #135,355 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of reculé vs reculées

Shared letters: celrué. Private to "reculé": -. Private to "reculées": s.

"reculé" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "reculées" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCVVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "reculé" and "reculées" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "reculé" is an adjective and "reculées" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "reculé" vs "reculées" - which ranks higher?
"reculé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,720 in our French list, against #37,515 for "reculées". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pair "reculé" vs "reculées" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "reculé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "reculées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #135,355 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "reculé" and "reculées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "reculées vs régulée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #135,355 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