sisevssteTell them apart

Quick tell: sise is a adjective, ste is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“sise” is an adjective and “ste” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#28,351
“sise” frequency rank
#10,412
“ste” frequency rank
38763
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sise ste
Definition Féminin singulier de sis. Troisième personne du singulier du passé simple de stare.

Where the eye mixes sise and ste

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
sise
3 ch
ste

Visual trap between sise and ste

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: sise is \siz\ while ste is \ˈstɛ\. 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 verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38763, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sise is recorded at frequency rank #28,351, classified as anadj, pronounced \siz\. ste is at rank #10,412, tagged as averb, pronounced \ˈstɛ\.

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 38763, this pair ranks #252,967 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of sise vs ste

Shared letters: es. Private to "sise": i. Private to "ste": t.

"sise" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "ste" · 3 letters · shape CCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • siseisse · sies · sisse · ssie · ssise

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "sise" and "ste" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "sise" is an adjective and "ste" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "sise" or "ste" show up more?
"ste" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,412 in our French list, against #28,351 for "sise". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "sise" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ste" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #252,967 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sise" and "ste" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sise vs stase". 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 #252,967 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