secouéevssecouruWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#32,593
“secouée” frequency rank
#27,964
“secouru” frequency rank
60557
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature secouée secouru
Definition Participe passé féminin singulier de secouer. Participe passé masculin singulier de secourir.

Where the eye mixes secouée and secouru

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. secouée (CVCVVVV) and secouru (CVCVVCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
secouée
7 ch
secouru

Visual trap between secouée and secouru

A purely visual mix-up. secouée (\sə.kwe\) and secouru (\sə.ku.ʁy\) 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 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60557, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

secouée is recorded at frequency rank #32,593, classified as averb, pronounced \sə.kwe\. secouru is at rank #27,964, tagged as averb, pronounced \sə.ku.ʁy\.

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 60557, this pair ranks #96,994 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of secouée vs secouru

Shared letters: ceosu. Private to "secouée": é. Private to "secouru": r.

"secouée" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVVV  ·  "secouru" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • secouru ← escouru · sceouru · seccouru · secoruu · secourru · secouur · secuoru · seocuru

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "secouée" for "secouru" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\sə.kwe\ versus \sə.ku.ʁy\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "secouée" or "secouru"?
"secouru" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #27,964 in our French list, against #32,593 for "secouée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "secouée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "secouru" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #96,994 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "secouée" and "secouru" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "secouée vs secouent". 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 #96,994 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