tuévsturnConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#1,543
“tué” frequency rank
#20,594
“turn” frequency rank
22137
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tué turn
Definition Homme, ou garçon, décédé par fait de violence. Deuxième personne du singulier de l’impératif présent de turnen.

Where the eye mixes tué and turn

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

3 ch
tué
4 ch
turn

Why the eye confuses tué with turn

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: tué is \tɥe\ while turn is \tʊʁn\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22137, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tué is recorded at frequency rank #1,543, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɥe\. turn is at rank #20,594, tagged as averb, pronounced \tʊʁn\.

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 22137, this pair ranks #359,660 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tué vs turn

Shared letters: tu. Private to "tué": é. Private to "turn": nr.

"tué" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "turn" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • turntrun · tturn · tunr · turnn · turrn · utrn

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "tué" and "turn" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tué" is a noun and "turn" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "tué" vs "turn" - which ranks higher?
"tué" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,543 in our French list, against #20,594 for "turn". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "tué" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "turn" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #359,660 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tué" and "turn" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "turf vs turn". 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 #359,660 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