femme

/fɛm/

//fɛm// noun

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

"femme" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“femme” has 5 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #22,671. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#22,671
frequency rank, English
2,507
“F” headwords
5
tracked misspellings
14
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A woman, a wife; (now chiefly Canada, US) a young woman or girl.

Corpus desk

Index EN-femme · femme · English

femme · rank #22,671 · 5 variants · 14 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #22,671
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-MID 14 pairs
  • VAR-MID 5 variants
  • BOOK-MID 2,507
  • PHOTO-FINISH fated

Nearest frequency peer: fated (-1 rank slots)

Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern

Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.

Rank peers near misspelling magnet “femme”

Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword

corpus weight

What this shows “femme” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

femme vs fete
60% similar
femme vs fume
60% similar
femme vs frame
60% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for femme
PropertyValue
Headwordfemme
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
IPA/fɛm/
Letters5
Frequency rank#22,671
Misspellings tracked5
Confusable pairs14
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “femme”

Word frequency stretches from the small set of words we reach for constantly (left) out to the long tail barely used once in a while (right).femmelands here:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Scale is logarithmic (each tick is 10× rarer). Same rarity band neighbours include “fated” (#22,670), “farts” (#22,669), “fibrosis” (#22,673). Among 2,507 “F” headwords, “femme” is #22,671. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 5 spelling variants around femme (IPA /fɛm/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #22,671 among 2,507 “F” headwords. Wiktionary lists 3 senses, so context still picks the gloss.

Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for femme, with forms such as "efmme", "feme", and "femem". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 14 confusable-pair relationships, "fete", "fume", "frame", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.

Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from French femme (“woman”). Doublet of feme, femina, and hembra. The correct English form is femme, spelled F-E-M-M-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    A woman, a wife; (now chiefly Canada, US) a young woman or girl.
  2. 2
    A lesbian or other queer woman whose appearance, identity etc. is seen as feminine as opposed to butch.
  3. 3
    A person whose gender is feminine-leaning, such as a feminine non-binary person.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how femme appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. Then I turned to him and said, "O my lord, I have that to propose to thee wherein thou must not cross me; and this it is that, when we reach Baghdad, my native city, I offer thee my life as thy handmaiden in holy matrimony, and thou shalt be to me baron and I will be femme to thee."
  2. Theodore J. Flicker and George Kirgo have penned a good script in which Elvis is played off against four femmes […].

Etymology

Borrowed from French femme (“woman”). Doublet of feme, femina, and hembra.

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • efmme
  • feme
  • femem
  • ffemme
  • fmeme

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of femme - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.

efmme2feme1femem2ffemme1fmeme2
Edit distance from "femme"

Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "femme"?
"femme" is spelled F-E-M-M-E. The IPA pronunciation is /fɛm/.
What does "femme" mean?
As a noun, "femme" means: A woman, a wife; (now chiefly Canada, US) a young woman or girl.
What words are commonly confused with "femme"?
"femme" is commonly confused with "fete", "fume", "frame". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "femme"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "femme" is /fɛm/. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What is the origin of the word "femme"?
Borrowed from French femme (“woman”). Doublet of feme, femina, and hembra. See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar English words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "femme", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

fated#22,670farts#22,669Faber#22,668foggy#22,675

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (5 here; floor ≥5).

Gigi5 variantskeel5 variantslemme5 variantsclot5 variants

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list