active

\ak.tiv\

/\ak.tiv\/ noun

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

The verdict

“active” has 8 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #2,861. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#2,861
frequency rank, French
6,727
“A” headwords
8
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Partie de l'armée qui, en temps de paix, est maintenue en état de combattre immédiatement.

Corpus desk

Index FR-active · active · French

active · rank #2,861 · 8 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-COMMON #2,861
  • LEN-LONG 6 letters
  • VOW-3 3 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-MID 8 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,727
  • PHOTO-FINISH abus

Nearest frequency peer: abus (-1 rank slots)

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.

Pairs de rang près de l'aimant d'erreurs « active »

Même bande de rareté: utile si une faute tombe sur un lemme voisin

corpus weight

What this shows « active » siège parmi ces pairs FrequencyWords; la profondeur des fautes est suivie à part dans le graphique d'édition.

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).

active vs alive
67% similar
active vs arrivé
50% similar
active vs attiré
50% similar

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

Key facts for active
PropertyValue
Headwordactive
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ak.tiv\
Letters6
Frequency rank#2,861
Misspellings tracked8
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Fréquence de l'aimant d'erreurs « active »

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.activese place ici:

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

L'axe est logarithmique: chaque tic marque environ dix fois moins de fréquence. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « abus » (#2,860), « vague » (#2,859), « anciennes » (#2,863). Parmi 6,727 lemmes en « A », « active » est au #2,861. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 8 spelling variants around active (IPA \ak.tiv\), anoun. Corpus frequency is #2,861 among 6,727 “A” headwords. Dominant gloss: "Partie de l'armée qui, en temps de paix, est maintenue en état de combattre immédiatement.".

Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for active, with forms such as "acctive", "acitve", and "actiev". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "alive", "arrivé", "attiré", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is active, spelled A-C-T-I-V-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Partie de l'armée qui, en temps de paix, est maintenue en état de combattre immédiatement.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Au reste, son sort eût contenté les pauvres caporaux d’active de toutes les garnisons de France.
  2. Ce document signé de la main d'un général au paraphe autoritaire prouvait, avec le charme que procurent ces belles calligraphies, qui majusculent jusqu'au nom des imbéciles, que dès l'âge de trente-neuf ans, le Caporal Lendemain, promu adjudant, passait de l’active à la réserve avec obligation de se tenir à la disposition des voltigeurs.

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • acctive
  • acitve
  • actiev
  • activve
  • acttive
  • actvie
  • atcive
  • cative

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of active - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.

acctive1acitve2actiev2activve1acttive1actvie2atcive2cative2
Edit distance from "active"

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 French corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "active"?
"active" is spelled A-C-T-I-V-E. The IPA pronunciation is \ak.tiv\.
What does "active" mean?
As a noun, "active" means: Partie de l'armée qui, en temps de paix, est maintenue en état de combattre immédiatement.
What words are commonly confused with "active"?
"active" is commonly confused with "alive", "arrivé", "attiré". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "active"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "active" is \ak.tiv\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "active" come from?
"active" is a French word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
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 French words by spelling shape

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

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

traite#2,857essais#2,877Moscou#2,886leader#2,832

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (8 here; floor ≥5).

degré8 variantsFranc8 variantsjulien8 variantspousser8 variants

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list