affreux

/\a.fʁø\/ adj

Letters

7 characters

Frequency Rank

#8,649

in French word usage

Misspellings

8

tracked variants

Confusables

3

similar word pairs

affreux is anFrenchadj. It means: Qui cause ou qui est propre à causer de la frayeur, de l’effroi. Pronounced \a.fʁø\. It ranks #8,649 in French word frequency. Often confused with afflux and affres.

Key facts for affreux
PropertyValue
Headwordaffreux
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdj
IPA\a.fʁø\
Letters7
Frequency rank#8,649
Misspellings tracked8
Confusable pairs3
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of affreux in French word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for affreux is 7 letters long, classified as anadj, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \a.fʁø\. Corpus data places it at rank #8,649 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 8 documented wrong-spelling variants for affreux, with forms such as "afferux", "affreuxx", and "affrexu". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 3 confusable-pair relationships, "afflux", "affres", "affreuse", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

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. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct French form is affreux, spelled A-F-F-R-E-U-X, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Qui cause ou qui est propre à causer de la frayeur, de l’effroi.
  2. 2
    Qualifie une personne d’une grande laideur ou une chose très désagréable.
  3. 3
    Qualifie une personne fort dépravée, capable des actions les plus noires, les plus viles.
  4. 4
    Qualifie ce qui peut susciter une grande pénibilité ou une extrême douleur.

Synonyms

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: afferux,affreuxx,affrexu,affrreux,affruex,afreux,afrfeux,fafreux

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for affreux

Misspelling Variants of "affreux"

afferux7affreuxx8affrexu7affrreux8affruex7afreux6afrfeux7fafreux7
Misspelling Variants of "affreux"

Frequency rank: #8,649 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "affreux"?
"affreux" is spelled A-F-F-R-E-U-X. The IPA pronunciation is \a.fʁø\.
What does "affreux" mean?
As an adj, "affreux" means: Qui cause ou qui est propre à causer de la frayeur, de l’effroi.
What words are commonly confused with "affreux"?
"affreux" is commonly confused with "afflux", "affres", "affreuse". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "affreux"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "affreux" is \a.fʁø\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "affreux" come from?
"affreux" 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.

Nearby French words

Other entries that begin with the letter A in our French index:

Explore PlainSpell

Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.