alien

\a.ljɛn\

/\a.ljɛn\/ noun

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

The verdict

“alien” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #13,726) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#13,726
frequency rank, French
6,727
“A” headwords
4
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Extraterrestre.

Corpus desk

Index FR-alien · alien · French

alien · rank #13,726 · 4 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #13,726
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-3 3 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-LOW 4 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,727
  • PHOTO-FINISH Africa

Nearest frequency peer: Africa (-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.

Voisins de fréquence du confusable « alien »

Pairs de poids proche dans le corpus, séparés des confusables ci-dessous

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « alien » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.

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).

alien vs amie
60% similar
alien vs allé
40% similar
alien vs Asie
40% similar

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

Key facts for alien
PropertyValue
Headwordalien
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\a.ljɛn\
Letters5
Frequency rank#13,726
Misspellings tracked4
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « alien »

La fréquence va de la poignée de mots du quotidien (gauche) à la longue queue presque jamais vue (droite).aliense place ici:

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

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « Africa » (#13,725), « aliment » (#13,727), « affronte » (#13,724). Parmi 6,727 lemmes en « A », « alien » est au #13,726. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for alien is neighbouring look-alikes ("amie", "allé", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced \a.ljɛn\. Frequency #13,726 among 6,727 “A” headwords. Gloss: "Extraterrestre.".

Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for alien, with forms such as "ailen", "alein", and "alienn". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "amie", "allé", "Asie", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.

This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct French form is alien, spelled A-L-I-E-N.

Definition

  1. 1
    Extraterrestre.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Pour moi, il était important que la Bête ne donne pas l’impression d’un alien tout droit sorti de Star Wars, comme l’est celui d’Arthur Rackham.
  2. Il a été décircuité par l’alien.

Synonyms

EBEentité biologique extraterrestreextraterrestrexénomorphe

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • ailen
  • alein
  • alienn
  • allien

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

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

ailen2alein2alienn1allien1
Edit distance from "alien"

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 "alien"?
"alien" is spelled A-L-I-E-N. The IPA pronunciation is \a.ljɛn\.
What does "alien" mean?
As a noun, "alien" means: Extraterrestre.
What words are commonly confused with "alien"?
"alien" is commonly confused with "amie", "allé", "Asie". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "alien"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "alien" is \a.ljɛn\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "alien" come from?
"alien" 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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

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

Same letter count

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

aveux#13,737board#13,742turbo#13,708tiges#13,704

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list