alt

\alt\

/\alt\/ adj

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

The verdict

“alt” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #15,561) as an adjective. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#15,561
frequency rank, French
6,727
“A” headwords
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Vieux, vieille, âgé, âgée.

Corpus desk

Index FR-alt · alt · French

alt · rank #15,561 · 0 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #15,561
  • LEN-MID 3 letters
  • VOW-1 1 vowel
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,727
  • PHOTO-FINISH alpin

Nearest frequency peer: alpin (-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 « alt »

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

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « alt » 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).

alt vs au
33% similar
alt vs As
0% similar
alt vs an
33% similar

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

Key facts for alt
PropertyValue
Headwordalt
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdjective
IPA\alt\
Letters3
Frequency rank#15,561
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « alt »

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).altse 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 « alpin » (#15,560), « amalgame » (#15,562), « amoureuses » (#15,563). Parmi 6,727 lemmes en « A », « alt » est au #15,561. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for alt is neighbouring look-alikes ("au", "As", …), not just typos; it is anadjective pronounced \alt\. Frequency #15,561 among 6,727 “A” headwords. 15 recorded senses keep meaning in play.

No generated misspelling entries exist for alt in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable French rules. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "au", "As", "an", and more, 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 its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct French form is alt, spelled A-L-T.

Definition

  1. 1
    Vieux, vieille, âgé, âgée.
  2. 2
    Ancien, classique, antique.
  3. 3
    Usagé, usagée.
  4. 4
    Vieux, de longue date, ancien.
  5. 5
    indique l’âge, après les données chiffrées:.
  6. 6
    Dépassé, périmé, désuet.
  7. 7
    De la période précédente.
  8. 8
    Éprouvé.
  9. 9
    ŕenforce une attribution négative et exprime le dégoût:.
  10. 10
    Précieux dû à son âge.
  11. 11
    Vénérable.
  12. 12
    Ancien, précédent, ex-.
  13. 13
    Préalable, antérieur, précédent.
  14. 14
    Tocard, tocarde, renforce une désignation négative.
  15. 15
    Vieux, renforce une désignation amicale.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Wie alt bist du?
  2. für wie alt halten Sie mich?

Synonyms

betagtgreis

Antonyms

jungneuzeitlos

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 "alt"?
"alt" is spelled A-L-T. The IPA pronunciation is \alt\.
What does "alt" mean?
As an adjective, "alt" means: Vieux, vieille, âgé, âgée.
What words are commonly confused with "alt"?
"alt" is commonly confused with "au", "As", "an". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "alt"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "alt" is \alt\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "alt" come from?
"alt" 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 "alt", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

aïe#15,571zut#15,542win#15,540dev#15,608

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list