soulagévssoulèveConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#16,485
“soulagé” frequency rank
#8,621
“soulève” frequency rank
25106
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature soulagé soulève
Definition Participe passé masculin singulier de soulager. Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de soulever.

Where the eye mixes soulagé and soulève

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. soulagé and soulève follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
soulagé
7 ch
soulève

Why the eye confuses soulagé with soulève

A purely visual mix-up. soulagé (\su.la.ʒe\) and soulève (\su.lɛv\) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 25106, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

soulagé is recorded at frequency rank #16,485, classified as averb, pronounced \su.la.ʒe\. soulève is at rank #8,621, tagged as averb, pronounced \su.lɛv\.

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 25106, this pair ranks #342,776 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of soulagé vs soulève

Shared letters: losu. Private to "soulagé": agé. Private to "soulève": evè.

"soulagé" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCV  ·  "soulève" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "soulagé" and "soulève" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\su.la.ʒe\ versus \su.lɛv\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "soulagé" or "soulève"?
"soulève" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,621 in our French list, against #16,485 for "soulagé". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "soulagé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "soulève" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #342,776 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "soulagé" and "soulève" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soulagé vs soutane". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #342,776 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