tuervstuésConfusable pair

Quick tell: tuer is a verb, tués is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“tuer” is a verb and “tués” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,426
“tuer” frequency rank
#3,809
“tués” frequency rank
5235
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tuer tués
Definition Ôter la vie d’une manière violente ; ne se dit pas quand il s’agit d'une euthanasie, ni à la forme pronominale dans le cas d’une mort accidentelle par noyade, étouffement ou empoisonnement : on emploie alors se noyer, s’étouffer, s’empoisonner. Masculin pluriel de tué.

Same sound, different letters: tuer vs tués

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 2 letters.

4 ch
tuer
4 ch
tués

Ear matches; page differs - tuer and tués

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: tuer and tués carry the same recorded pronunciation, \tɥe\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is averb, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5235, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tuer is recorded at frequency rank #1,426, classified as averb, pronounced \tɥe\. tués is at rank #3,809, tagged as anadj, pronounced \tɥe\.

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 5235, this pair ranks #429,572 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tuer vs tués

Shared letters: tu. Private to "tuer": er. Private to "tués": .

"tuer" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "tués" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tuerteur · ttuer · tuerr · ture · uter

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "tuer" and "tués" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tuer" is a verb and "tués" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "tuer" or "tués" show up more?
"tuer" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,426 in our French list, against #3,809 for "tués". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

"tuer" and "tués" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "tuer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tués" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #429,572 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tuer" and "tués" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tués vs turf". 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 #429,572 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