restéevsriséeWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#5,073
“restée” frequency rank
#28,725
“risée” frequency rank
33798
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature restée risée
Definition Féminin singulier de resté. Grand éclat de rire que font plusieurs personnes ensemble, en se moquant de quelqu’un ou de quelque chose.

Where the eye mixes restée and risée

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

6 ch
restée
5 ch
risée

Look-alike desk: restée vs risée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: restée is \ʁɛs.te\ while risée is \ʁi.ze\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 33798, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

restée is recorded at frequency rank #5,073, classified as anadj, pronounced \ʁɛs.te\. risée is at rank #28,725, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁi.ze\.

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 33798, this pair ranks #288,203 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of restée vs risée

Shared letters: ersé. Private to "restée": t. Private to "risée": i.

"restée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "risée" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "restée" for "risée" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "restée" is an adjective and "risée" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "restée" or "risée" show up more?
"restée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,073 in our French list, against #28,725 for "risée". 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 "restée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "risée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #288,203 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "restée" and "risée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rasées vs risée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #288,203 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