Which to use
“retard” and “retardée” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,494
- “retard” frequency rank
- #25,112
- “retardée” frequency rank
- 26606
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | retard | retardée |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Fait d’arriver, de se produire plus tard que prévu, d’agir trop tard ; délai, remise, ralentissement. | Femme qui a été retardée. |
Where the eye mixes retard and retardée
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. retard runs 6 letters (CVCVCC) against retardée's 8 (CVCVCCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: retard vs retardée
A purely visual mix-up. retard (\ʁə.taʁ\) and retardée (\ʁə.taʁ.de\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “retard” sits inside “retardée”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26606, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
retard is recorded at frequency rank #1,494, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁə.taʁ\. retardée is at rank #25,112, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁə.taʁ.de\.
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 26606, this pair ranks #333,951 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of retard vs retardée
Shared letters: adert. Private to "retard": -. Private to "retardée": é.
"retard" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC · "retardée" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- retard ← ertard · reatrd · retadr · retardd · retarrd · retrad · rettard · rretard
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "retard" and "retardée" be used interchangeably?
Frequency check: "retard" vs "retardée" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "retard" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "retardée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #333,951 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "retard" and "retardée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "remariée vs retardée". 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 #333,951 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.