regardsvsrégatesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#5,698
“regards” frequency rank
#45,850
“régates” frequency rank
51548
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature regards régates
Definition Pluriel de regard. Pluriel de régate.

Where the eye mixes regards and régates

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

7 ch
regards
7 ch
régates

Visual trap between regards and régates

A purely visual mix-up. regards (\ʁə.ɡaʁ\) and régates (\ʁe.ɡat\) 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 51548, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

regards is recorded at frequency rank #5,698, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁə.ɡaʁ\. régates is at rank #45,850, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁe.ɡat\.

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 51548, this pair ranks #154,185 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of regards vs régates

Shared letters: aegrs. Private to "regards": d. Private to "régates": .

"regards" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCC  ·  "régates" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • regardsergards · reagrds · regadrs · regardds · regardss · regarrds · regarsd · reggards

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "regards" and "régates" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ʁə.ɡaʁ\ versus \ʁe.ɡat\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "regards" or "régates"?
"regards" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,698 in our French list, against #45,850 for "régates". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "regards" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "régates" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #154,185 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "regards" and "régates" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "régates vs relatés". 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 #154,185 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