refilévsreliéeConfusable pair

Quick tell: refilé is a verb, reliée is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#35,239
“refilé” frequency rank
#17,541
“reliée” frequency rank
52780
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature refilé reliée
Definition Participe passé masculin singulier de refiler. Féminin singulier de relié.

Where the eye mixes refilé and reliée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. refilé (CVCVCV) and reliée (CVCVVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

6 ch
refilé
6 ch
reliée

Why the eye confuses refilé with reliée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: refilé is \ʁə.fi.le\ while reliée is \ʁə.lje\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 52780, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

refilé is recorded at frequency rank #35,239, classified as averb, pronounced \ʁə.fi.le\. reliée is at rank #17,541, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʁə.lje\.

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 52780, this pair ranks #145,353 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of refilé vs reliée

Shared letters: eilré. Private to "refilé": f. Private to "reliée": -.

"refilé" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "reliée" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "refilé" and "reliée" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "refilé" is a verb and "reliée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "refilé" or "reliée"?
"reliée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,541 in our French list, against #35,239 for "refilé". 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 "refilé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "reliée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #145,353 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "refilé" and "reliée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "recife vs refilé". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #145,353 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