regardaisvsregardaitTell them apart

Which to use

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

#10,221
“regardais” frequency rank
#8,610
“regardait” frequency rank
18831
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature regardais regardait
Definition Première personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de regarder. Troisième personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de regarder.

Same sound, different letters: regardais vs regardait

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 8 letters. regardais and regardait follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

9 ch
regardais
9 ch
regardait

Homophone desk: regardais vs regardait

This is the hard kind. regardais and regardait are pronounced identically (\ʁə.ɡaʁ.dɛ\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by a single letter - s in “regardais” becomes t in “regardait”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18831, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

regardais is recorded at frequency rank #10,221, classified as averb, pronounced \ʁə.ɡaʁ.dɛ\. regardait is at rank #8,610, tagged as averb, pronounced \ʁə.ɡaʁ.dɛ\.

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 18831, this pair ranks #376,362 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of regardais vs regardait

Shared letters: adegir. Private to "regardais": s. Private to "regardait": t.

"regardais" · 9 letters · shape CVCVCCVVC  ·  "regardait" · 9 letters · shape CVCVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • regardaisergardais · reagrdais · regadrais · regaradis · regardaiss · regardasi · regarddais · regardias
  • regardaitergardait · reagrdait · regadrait · regaradit · regardaitt · regardati · regarddait · regardiat

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "regardais" for "regardait" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\ʁə.ɡaʁ.dɛ\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "regardais" vs "regardait" - which ranks higher?
"regardait" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,610 in our French list, against #10,221 for "regardais". 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 "regardais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "regardait" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #376,362 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "regardais" and "regardait" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "regardait vs repartait". 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 #376,362 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