soulignévssoulignéeWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: souligné is a noun, soulignée is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“souligné” is a noun and “soulignée” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#7,905
“souligné” frequency rank
#34,317
“soulignée” frequency rank
42222
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature souligné soulignée
Definition Tiret bas. Participe passé féminin singulier de souligner.

Same sound, different letters: souligné vs soulignée

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 8 letters. souligné runs 8 letters (CVVCVCCV) against soulignée's 9 (CVVCVCCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
souligné
9 ch
soulignée

Homophone desk: souligné vs soulignée

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: souligné and soulignée carry the same recorded pronunciation, \su.li.ɲe\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “souligné” sits inside “soulignée”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 42222, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

souligné is recorded at frequency rank #7,905, classified as anoun, pronounced \su.li.ɲe\. soulignée is at rank #34,317, tagged as averb, pronounced \su.li.ɲe\.

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 42222, this pair ranks #227,259 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of souligné vs soulignée

Shared letters: gilnosué. Private to "souligné": -. Private to "soulignée": e.

"souligné" · 8 letters · shape CVVCVCCV  ·  "soulignée" · 9 letters · shape CVVCVCCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "souligné" and "soulignée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "souligné" is a noun and "soulignée" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "souligné" or "soulignée"?
"souligné" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,905 in our French list, against #34,317 for "soulignée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've separated the homophone pair "souligné" / "soulignée". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "souligné" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "soulignée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #227,259 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "souligné" and "soulignée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soulignée vs soulignés". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #227,259 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