stagevsstrateWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#2,598
“stage” frequency rank
#41,019
“strate” frequency rank
43617
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature stage strate
Definition Période de travail auprès d’un employeur, effectuée à des fins de formation et faisant partie intégrante d’un cursus scolaire ou de l’enseignement supérieur. Couche, niveau parmi plusieurs.

Where the eye mixes stage and strate

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
stage
6 ch
strate

Look-alike desk: stage vs strate

A purely visual mix-up. stage (\staʒ\) and strate (\stʁat\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43617, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

stage is recorded at frequency rank #2,598, classified as anoun, pronounced \staʒ\. strate is at rank #41,019, tagged as anoun, pronounced \stʁat\.

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 43617, this pair ranks #216,690 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of stage vs strate

Shared letters: aest. Private to "stage": g. Private to "strate": r.

"stage" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "strate" · 6 letters · shape CCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • stagesatge · sstage · staeg · stagge · stgae · sttage · tsage
  • stratesrtate · sstrate · starte · straet · stratte · strrate · strtae · sttrate

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "stage" for "strate" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\staʒ\ versus \stʁat\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "stage" vs "strate" - which ranks higher?
"stage" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,598 in our French list, against #41,019 for "strate". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "stage" and "strate" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "stage" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "strate" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #216,690 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "stage" and "strate" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "stase vs strate". 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 #216,690 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