situévssteWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#1,497
“situé” frequency rank
#10,412
“ste” frequency rank
11909
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature situé ste
Definition Qui se trouve en un lieu identifié. Troisième personne du singulier du passé simple de stare.

Where the eye mixes situé and ste

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

5 ch
situé
3 ch
ste

Visual trap between situé and ste

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: situé is \si.tɥe\ while ste is \ˈstɛ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 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 11909, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

situé is recorded at frequency rank #1,497, classified as anadj, pronounced \si.tɥe\. 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 11909, this pair ranks #407,312 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of situé vs ste

Shared letters: st. Private to "situé": iué. Private to "ste": e.

"situé" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "ste" · 3 letters · shape CCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "situé" and "ste" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "situé" is an adjective and "ste" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "situé" vs "ste" - which ranks higher?
"situé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,497 in our French list, against #10,412 for "ste". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "situé" 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 #407,312 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "situé" and "ste" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ste vs suu". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #407,312 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