boutade

\bu.tad\

/\bu.tad\/ noun

The verdict

“boutade” has 9 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #29,257. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#29,257
frequency rank, French
4,251
“B” headwords
9
tracked misspellings
4
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Caprice, saillie d’esprit et d’humeur ^([1]) ^([2]).

Corpus desk

Index FR-boutade · boutade · French

boutade · rank #29,257 · 9 variants · 4 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #29,257
  • LEN-LONG 7 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-MID 4 pairs
  • VAR-MID 9 variants
  • BOOK-MID 4,251
  • PHOTO-FINISH Boulay

Nearest frequency peer: Boulay (-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.

Pairs de rang près de l'aimant d'erreurs « boutade »

Même bande de rareté: utile si une faute tombe sur un lemme voisin

corpus weight

What this shows « boutade » siège parmi ces pairs FrequencyWords; la profondeur des fautes est suivie à part dans le graphique d'édition.

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).

boutade vs brutale
71% similar
boutade vs boude
71% similar
boutade vs bourde
71% similar

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

Key facts for boutade
PropertyValue
Headwordboutade
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\bu.tad\
Letters7
Frequency rank#29,257
Misspellings tracked9
Confusable pairs4
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Fréquence de l'aimant d'erreurs « boutade »

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).boutadese place ici:

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

L'axe est logarithmique: chaque tic marque environ dix fois moins de fréquence. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « Boulay » (#29,256), « branleur » (#29,258), « bougeait » (#29,255). Parmi 4,251 lemmes en « B », « boutade » est au #29,257. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 9 spelling variants around boutade (IPA \bu.tad\), anoun. Corpus frequency is #29,257 among 4,251 “B” headwords. Wiktionary lists 3 senses, so context still picks the gloss.

Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for boutade, with forms such as "bboutade", "botuade", and "bouatde". 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 4 confusable-pair relationships, "brutale", "boude", "bourde", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is boutade, spelled B-O-U-T-A-D-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Caprice, saillie d’esprit et d’humeur ^([1]) ^([2]).
  2. 2
    Vers faits par caprice ^([2]).
  3. 3
    Danse figurée, petit ballet impromptu ^([2]).

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Messieurs, dit-il, votre esprit s’évapore en boutades qui ne mènent à rien ; il serait temps, selon moi, de prendre les choses par le côté sérieux, et d’en parler sérieusement.
  2. Et satisfait outre mesure de cette boutade philosophique, qui lui paraissait pleine d’à-propos, le Canadien s’enveloppa d’un épais nuage de fumée.

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • bboutade
  • botuade
  • bouatde
  • boutadde
  • boutaed
  • boutdae
  • bouttade
  • buotade
  • obutade

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

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

bboutade1botuade2bouatde2boutadde1boutaed2boutdae2bouttade1buotade2
Edit distance from "boutade"

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 "boutade"?
"boutade" is spelled B-O-U-T-A-D-E. The IPA pronunciation is \bu.tad\.
What does "boutade" mean?
As a noun, "boutade" means: Caprice, saillie d’esprit et d’humeur ^([1]) ^([2]).
What words are commonly confused with "boutade"?
"boutade" is commonly confused with "brutale", "boude", "bourde". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "boutade"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "boutade" is \bu.tad\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "boutade" come from?
"boutade" 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 "boutade", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (9 here; floor ≥5).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list