Which to use
“serrée” and “soirée” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #14,564
- “serrée” frequency rank
- #832
- “soirée” frequency rank
- 15396
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | serrée | soirée |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Contraction. | Espace de temps depuis le déclin du jour jusqu’au moment où l’on se couche (par exemple entre 18 et 24 heures). |
Where the eye mixes serrée and soirée
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. serrée (CVCCVV) and soirée (CVVCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Look-alike desk: serrée vs soirée
A purely visual mix-up. serrée (\se.ʁe\) and soirée (\swa.ʁe\) 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 15396, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
serrée is recorded at frequency rank #14,564, classified as anoun, pronounced \se.ʁe\. soirée is at rank #832, tagged as anoun, pronounced \swa.ʁe\.
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 15396, this pair ranks #392,543 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of serrée vs soirée
Shared letters: ersé. Private to "serrée": -. Private to "soirée": io.
"serrée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV · "soirée" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVV
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "serrée" for "soirée" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "serrée" or "soirée" show up more?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "serrée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "soirée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #392,543 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "serrée" and "soirée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "semée vs serrée". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #392,543 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.