saignévssaignerTell them apart

Which to use

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

#30,358
“saigné” frequency rank
#17,265
“saigner” frequency rank
47623
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature saigné saigner
Definition Participe passé masculin singulier de saigner. Tirer du sang en ouvrant une veine.

Same sound, different letters: saigné vs saigner

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. saigné runs 6 letters (CVVCCV) against saigner's 7 (CVVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
saigné
7 ch
saigner

Homophone desk: saigné vs saigner

This is the hard kind. saigné and saigner are pronounced identically (\se.ɲe\) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47623, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

saigné is recorded at frequency rank #30,358, classified as averb, pronounced \se.ɲe\. saigner is at rank #17,265, tagged as averb, pronounced \se.ɲe\.

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 47623, this pair ranks #185,485 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of saigné vs saigner

Shared letters: agins. Private to "saigné": é. Private to "saigner": er.

"saigné" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV  ·  "saigner" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • saigner ← asigner · saginer · saigenr · saiggner · saignerr · saignner · saignre · sainger

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "saigné" for "saigner" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\se.ɲe\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
In ordinary French text, does "saigné" or "saigner" show up more?
"saigner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,265 in our French list, against #30,358 for "saigné". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "saigné" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "saigner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #185,485 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "saigné" and "saigner" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "saigné vs Saïgon". 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 #185,485 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