avoir les pieds sur terre

\a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\

/\a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\/ verb

The verdict

“avoir les pieds sur terre” is outside the top-ranked French vocabulary, used as a verb - the kind of word writers most often double-check.

Unranked
below top-frequency French
25
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Être réaliste.

Key facts for avoir les pieds sur terre
PropertyValue
Headwordavoir les pieds sur terre
LanguageFrench
Part of speechVerb
IPA\a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\
Letters25
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “avoir les pieds sur terre” sits in French frequency

avoir les pieds sur terre falls outside the top-100,000 ranked French words, the long-tail zone of technical, archaic, or low-frequency vocabulary, exactly where readers second-guess spellings most.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for avoir les pieds sur terre is 25 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

No misspelling variants are generated for avoir les pieds sur terre in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

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 avoir les pieds sur terre, spelled A-V-O-I-R- -L-E-S- -P-I-E-D-S- -S-U-R- -T-E-R-R-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Être réaliste.
  2. 2
    Avoir du bon sens.

Antonyms

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.

Cite this page

Free to reuse with attribution (CC BY-SA). Copy the citation:

PlainSpell, “avoir les pieds sur terre, French word data” (May 6, 2026). Derived from Wiktionary (kaikki.org, CC BY-SA) and an open word-frequency list. https://plainspell.com/fr/mot/avoir-les-pieds-sur-terre

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "avoir les pieds sur terre"?
"avoir les pieds sur terre" is spelled A-V-O-I-R- -L-E-S- -P-I-E-D-S- -S-U-R- -T-E-R-R-E. The IPA pronunciation is \a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\.
What does "avoir les pieds sur terre" mean?
As a verb, "avoir les pieds sur terre" means: Être réaliste.
How do you pronounce "avoir les pieds sur terre"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "avoir les pieds sur terre" is \a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "avoir les pieds sur terre" come from?
"avoir les pieds sur terre" 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.

Using “avoir les pieds sur terre”

The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.

  • The one correct French spelling is A-V-O-I-R- -L-E-S- -P-I-E-D-S- -S-U-R- -T-E-R-R-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
  • Say it as \a.vwaʁ le pje syʁ tɛʁ\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
  • Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words

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. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list