uséevsusitéTell them apart

Which to use

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

#30,852
“usée” frequency rank
#41,053
“usité” frequency rank
71905
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature usée usité
Definition Féminin singulier de usé. Qui est en usage, qui est pratiqué communément.

Where the eye mixes usée and usité

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. usée runs 4 letters (VCVV) against usité's 5 (VCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
usée
5 ch
usité

Why the eye confuses usée with usité

A purely visual mix-up. usée (\y.ze\) and usité (\y.zi.te\) 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 71905, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

usée is recorded at frequency rank #30,852, classified as anadj, pronounced \y.ze\. usité is at rank #41,053, tagged as anadj, pronounced \y.zi.te\.

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 71905, this pair ranks #45,856 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of usée vs usité

Shared letters: sué. Private to "usée": e. Private to "usité": it.

"usée" · 4 letters · shape VCVV  ·  "usité" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "usée" and "usité" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\y.ze\ versus \y.zi.te\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "usée" or "usité"?
"usée" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #30,852 in our French list, against #41,053 for "usité". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "usée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "usité" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #45,856 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "usée" and "usité" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "uit vs usité". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #45,856 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