surveilléevssurveillentTell them apart

Which to use

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

#19,167
“surveillée” frequency rank
#23,042
“surveillent” frequency rank
42209
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature surveillée surveillent
Definition Participe passé féminin singulier de surveiller. Troisième personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de surveiller.

Where the eye mixes surveillée and surveillent

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence. surveillée runs 10 letters (CVCCVVCCVV) against surveillent's 11 (CVCCVVCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

10 ch
surveillée
11 ch
surveillent

Look-alike desk: surveillée vs surveillent

A purely visual mix-up. surveillée (\syʁ.ve.je\) and surveillent (\syʁ.vɛj\) 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 42209, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

surveillée is recorded at frequency rank #19,167, classified as averb, pronounced \syʁ.ve.je\. surveillent is at rank #23,042, tagged as averb, pronounced \syʁ.vɛj\.

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 42209, this pair ranks #227,378 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of surveillée vs surveillent

Shared letters: eilrsuv. Private to "surveillée": é. Private to "surveillent": nt.

"surveillée" · 10 letters · shape CVCCVVCCVV  ·  "surveillent" · 11 letters · shape CVCCVVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • surveillent ← sruveillent · ssurveillent · surevillent · surrveillent · surveilelnt · surveilent · surveillennt · surveillentt

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "surveillée" and "surveillent" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\syʁ.ve.je\ versus \syʁ.vɛj\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "surveillée" vs "surveillent" - which ranks higher?
"surveillée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,167 in our French list, against #23,042 for "surveillent". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "surveillée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "surveillent" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #227,378 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "surveillée" and "surveillent" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "surveillante vs surveillent". 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 #227,378 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