confidante
Americannoun
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a woman to whom secrets are confided or with whom private matters and problems are discussed.
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Furniture. confidente.
noun
Usage
What’s the difference between confidante, confidant, and confident? The word confidante is a gender-specific form of confidant, a noun meaning someone you feel comfortable telling secret or private things to—a person you confide in. Confidante is specifically applied to women. Confident is an adjective that means sure of oneself or one’s abilities, or having a high level of certainty about something. Very rarely, the word confident can be used as a noun meaning the same thing as confidant, but we’re pretty confident almost no one uses it this way. We’re also sorry to report that there’s a kind of sofa called a confidente that can also be called a confidante, but honestly you’ll be better off if you just forget we ever said anything about it. Confidant and confidante are borrowed from French, which has grammatical gender, so some words end differently depending on whether they are applied to men or women (with e being the feminine ending). This happens in a few other pairs of words in English, like blond and blonde, though in many cases the term without the e has become largely gender-neutral. This is the case with confidant, which is the more commonly used of the two. What’s the best way to be confident that you’re using the right word? Just remember that the ending of both confidant and confidante sounds like the more formal pronunciation of aunt—your aunt could be your confidant (as could your commandant, the ending of which also sounds the same). The ending of confident, on the other hand, sounds like dent. Here’s an example of confidante and confident used correctly in the same sentence. (The word confidante could be replaced with confidant if you wanted to make the term gender-neutral.)Example: I am confident that what I confide to my confidante stays confidential. Want to learn more? Read the full breakdown of the difference between confidante, confidant, and confident.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of confidante
First recorded in 1700–10, confidante is from the French word confidente
Explanation
If you're a confidante, two things must be true: you have to be female, and you must be someone who people feel comfortable telling secrets to. If you have a confidante, you're lucky. She is a friend you can confide in, someone you trust with your private thoughts, and who you're sure can keep a secret. If your trusted friend is male, you call him your confidant. In fact, you could call a male or a female "secret keeper" your confidant (without the "e"). Both versions of the word come from the same root as confident — which you can trace back to the Latin word meaning "to trust or confide," confidentem.
Vocabulary lists containing confidante
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The party's new leader, Gavin Robinson, who had been a confidante of Donaldson, chose his language carefully, saying there should have been more "cautious realism" about promoting the deal.
From BBC ● Jun. 22, 2026
Now an activist in exile, she is a confidante of Fraser Pardington, the Mandarin-speaking president of the United States.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 22, 2026
The records, earlier reported by Argentina’s La Nación and reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, show calls that same night between Novelli and Karina Milei, who is the president’s sister and closest confidante.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026
This week, Kim Yo Jong, a powerful confidante of her brother Kim Jong Un, said the joint drills "may cause unimaginably terrible consequences".
From Barron's ● Mar. 14, 2026
Except for Argénida, her servant and confidante, no one ever had any more contact with her after that.
From "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
From then on, the two would remain friends, correspondents, confidantes, sounding boards, and inspirations to one another.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026
He was found to have been staying near his hometown of Castelvetrano in western Sicily, his fugitive lifestyle facilitated by his sister and close confidantes.
From Barron's ● May 28, 2026
If so, he's considered one of his grandfather's most trusted confidantes, having been his personal bodyguard, and more business-orientated than ideological, with no high-level diplomatic experience.
From BBC ● Feb. 27, 2026
But the rhetoric of his top confidantes has grown more extreme in recent days.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2025
They were the best confidantes for a lonely little girl.
From "Krik? Krak!" by Edwidge Danticat
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
