cheval

/\ʃə.val\/ noun

Letters

6 characters

Frequency Rank

#1,654

in French word usage

Misspellings

9

tracked variants

Confusables

12

similar word pairs

cheval is aFrenchnoun. It means: Grand mammifère périssodactyle de la famille des équidés, habituellement domestiqué et employé comme monture ou comme bête de trait, de somme. Pronounced \ʃə.val\. It ranks #1,654 in French word frequency. Often confused with chèvre and chevet.

Key facts for cheval
PropertyValue
Headwordcheval
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ʃə.val\
Letters6
Frequency rank#1,654
Misspellings tracked9
Confusable pairs12
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of cheval in French word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for cheval is 6 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \ʃə.val\. Corpus data places it at rank #1,654 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 13 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 9 documented wrong-spelling variants for cheval, with forms such as "ccheval", "cehval", and "cheavl". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 12 confusable-pair relationships, "chèvre", "chevet", "cheveu", 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 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 cheval, spelled C-H-E-V-A-L, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Grand mammifère périssodactyle de la famille des équidés, habituellement domestiqué et employé comme monture ou comme bête de trait, de somme.
  2. 2
    Viande de cet animal.
  3. 3
    Appellation courante de cheval-vapeur, puissance mécanique équivalente à 748 watts.
  4. 4
    Cheval fiscal, dont l’abréviation est cv ou CV.
  5. 5
    Héroïne (drogue).
  6. 6
    Appareil gymnique, utilisé pour deux agrès différents : le cheval d’arçons et le saut de cheval.
  7. 7
    Synonyme parfois utilisé pour désigner une personne, autrefois surtout pour une personne stupide.
  8. 8
    Meuble représentant l’animal du même nom dans les armoiries. Il est généralement représenté de profil et passant.
  9. 9
    Pièce de certains jeux comme les petits chevaux, et parfois le cavalier aux échecs à cause de la forme de la pièce.
  10. 10
    Défaut du marbre consistant en une cavité emplie de matière pulvérulente, terreuse. (Note : on dit aussi une cendrure.)
  11. 11
    Article commençant au bas de la dernière colonne de la première page d'un journal.
  12. 12
    Pièce du jeu de shōgi qui constitue la forme promue du fou (« dragon-cheval » en japonais).
  13. 13
    Équitation.

Synonyms

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: ccheval,cehval,cheavl,chevall,chevla,chevval,chheval,chveal,hceval

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for cheval

Misspelling Variants of "cheval"

ccheval7cehval6cheavl6chevall7chevla6chevval7chheval7chveal6
Misspelling Variants of "cheval"

Frequency rank: #1,654 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "cheval"?
"cheval" is spelled C-H-E-V-A-L. The IPA pronunciation is \ʃə.val\.
What does "cheval" mean?
As a noun, "cheval" means: Grand mammifère périssodactyle de la famille des équidés, habituellement domestiqué et employé comme monture ou comme bête de trait, de somme.
What words are commonly confused with "cheval"?
"cheval" is commonly confused with "chèvre", "chevet", "cheveu". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "cheval"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "cheval" is \ʃə.val\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "cheval" come from?
"cheval" 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.

Nearby French words

Other entries that begin with the letter C in our French index:

Explore PlainSpell

Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.