cliffhanger
\klif.ɛŋ.əʁ\
The verdict
“cliffhanger” is an uncommon French word, ranked #72,194 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #72,194
- frequency rank, French
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Procédé narratif employé en littérature, en BD, au cinéma, à la télévision, où l’on crée une situation de suspense afin de tenir en haleine le lecteur, le spectateur.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | cliffhanger |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \klif.ɛŋ.əʁ\ |
| Letters | 11 |
| Frequency rank | #72,194 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “cliffhanger” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for cliffhanger is 11 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \klif.ɛŋ.əʁ\. Corpus data places it at rank #72,194 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Procédé narratif employé en littérature, en BD, au cinéma, à la télévision, où l’on crée une situation de suspense afin de tenir en haleine le lecteur, le spectateur.".
No misspelling variants are generated for cliffhanger in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable French rules. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is cliffhanger, spelled C-L-I-F-F-H-A-N-G-E-R.
Definition
- 1Procédé narratif employé en littérature, en BD, au cinéma, à la télévision, où l’on crée une situation de suspense afin de tenir en haleine le lecteur, le spectateur.
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); 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
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Using “cliffhanger”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is C-L-I-F-F-H-A-N-G-E-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \klif.ɛŋ.əʁ\ (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
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.