avoir les cartes en main
\a.vwaʁ le kaʁ.t‿ɑ̃ mɛ̃\
The verdict
“avoir les cartes en main” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 24
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Maîtriser une situation, en avoir le contrôle, être en position de force.
Corpus desk
Index FR-avoir-les-cartes-en-main · avoir les cartes en main · French
avoir les cartes en main · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 24 letters
- VOW-9 9 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "A" 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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | avoir les cartes en main |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | \a.vwaʁ le kaʁ.t‿ɑ̃ mɛ̃\ |
| Letters | 24 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « avoir les cartes en main » en français
Rare enough to double-check
avoir les cartes en main is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as averb, transcribed \a.vwaʁ le kaʁ.t‿ɑ̃ mɛ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Maîtriser une situation, en avoir le contrôle, être en position de force.".
avoir les cartes en main doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct French form is avoir les cartes en main, spelled A-V-O-I-R- -L-E-S- -C-A-R-T-E-S- -E-N- -M-A-I-N.
Definition
- 1Maîtriser une situation, en avoir le contrôle, être en position de force.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how avoir les cartes en main appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Avec le sentiment de prendre place dans l’Histoire, et la jubilation d’avoir les cartes en main.
Il avait pris conscience désormais qu’il n’avait plus toutes les cartes en main, comme cela avait toujours été le cas jusqu’ici.
This word in other languages
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.