Le Havre
/lə ˈhɑːvɹə/
"le-havre" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Le Havre” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a proper noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A city and major port beside the mouth of the River Seine in Seine-Maritime department, Normandy, northern France.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Le Havre |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| IPA | /lə ˈhɑːvɹə/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Le Havre” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
Le Havre is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as aproper noun, transcribed /lə ˈhɑːvɹə/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A city and major port beside the mouth of the River Seine in Seine-Maritime department, Normandy, northern France.".
No misspelling variants are generated for Le Havre in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from French Le Havre (“The Harbor”), a 19th-century French clipping of Le Havre-de-Grâce (“The Harbor of Grace”), a combination of its earlier Norman name Hable (“Harbor”) and the short-lived name Ville-de-Grâce, which it bore following its 1517 re… The correct English form is Le Havre, spelled L-E- -H-A-V-R-E.
Definition
- 1A city and major port beside the mouth of the River Seine in Seine-Maritime department, Normandy, northern France.
Etymology
Borrowed from French Le Havre (“The Harbor”), a 19th-century French clipping of Le Havre-de-Grâce (“The Harbor of Grace”), a combination of its earlier Norman name Hable (“Harbor”) and the short-lived name Ville-de-Grâce, which it bore following its 1517 refounding by Francis I, referencing the supposedly miraculous icon of the Virgin Mary acquired by Cambrai Cathedral in 1450 and known in French as Notre-Dame de Grâce. Nearby Honfleur had similarly named its cathedral (subsequently destroyed by a landslide) in its honor.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “Le Havre”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is L-E- -H-A-V-R-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /lə ˈhɑːvɹə/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.