Bovary
\bɔ.va.ʁi\
The verdict
“Bovary” has 9 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #37,698. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #37,698
- frequency rank, French
- 227,490
- “B” headwords
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 4
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Nom de famille d’origine anglaise.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Bovary |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| IPA | \bɔ.va.ʁi\ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #37,698 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 4 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Bovary” sits in French frequency
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 9 spelling variants around Bovary (IPA \bɔ.va.ʁi\), aproper noun. Corpus frequency is #37,698 among 227,490 “B” headwords. Wiktionary lists 2 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for Bovary, with forms such as "bbovary", "boavry", and "bovarry". 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, "boyard", "board", "bavard", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is Bovary, spelled B-O-V-A-R-Y.
Definition
- 1Nom de famille d’origine anglaise.
- 2Femme bourgeoise qui s'ennuie dans son ménage, à l'image de l'héroïne éponyme du roman Madame Bovary.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: bbovary,boavry,bovarry,bovaryy,bovayr,bovray,bovvary,bvoary,obvary
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Bovary - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 "Bovary"?
What does "Bovary" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "Bovary"?
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Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “Bovary”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is B-O-V-A-R-Y - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \bɔ.va.ʁi\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “boyard” - see the side-by-side comparison. Bovary vs boyard
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Same frequency band
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.