à voix basse

\a vwa bas\

/\a vwa bas\/ adv

The verdict

“à voix basse” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adverb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency French
12
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Avec un faible volume sonore, en parlant de s'exprimer oralement.

Corpus desk

Index FR-a-voix-basse · à voix basse · French

à voix basse · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-MEGA 12 letters
  • VOW-5 5 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-THIN "À" thin
  • PHOTO-UNK Peer pending

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.

Key facts for à voix basse
PropertyValue
Headwordà voix basse
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdverb
IPA\a vwa bas\
Letters12
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « à voix basse » en français

à voix bassereste hors des 100.000 mots français les plus fréquents, dans la longue queue du vocabulaire technique, archaïque ou rare, là où le doute d'orthographe frappe.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

à voix basse is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as anadverb, transcribed \a vwa bas\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Avec un faible volume sonore, en parlant de s'exprimer oralement.".

Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for à voix basse, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct French form is à voix basse, spelled À- -V-O-I-X- -B-A-S-S-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Avec un faible volume sonore, en parlant de s'exprimer oralement.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. […] un groupe d'hommes en casquette discutait à voix basse près de la porte à tambour du fond.
  2. Le café quasi désert ne comptait que son Guy de propriétaire plus un vieux pousse-mégot qui parlait à voix basse au fond de la pièce adjacente, […].

Synonyms

Antonyms

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

How do you spell "à voix basse"?
"à voix basse" is spelled À- -V-O-I-X- -B-A-S-S-E. The IPA pronunciation is \a vwa bas\.
What does "à voix basse" mean?
As an adverb, "à voix basse" means: Avec un faible volume sonore, en parlant de s'exprimer oralement.
How do you pronounce "à voix basse"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "à voix basse" is \a vwa bas\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "à voix basse" come from?
"à voix basse" is a French word. PlainSpell covers definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German.
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.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list