crue

Name: crue, French Word Data
Creator: Wiktionary
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

\kʁy\

/\kʁy\/ noun

By PlainSpell · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) · analyzed September 3, 2026

The verdict

“crue” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #9,300) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#9,300
frequency rank, French: 8,609
“C” headwords: 4
tracked misspellings: 20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Augmentation temporaire et généralement rapide du débit ou du niveau d’un cours d’eau, liée aux précipitations, à la fonte des neiges ou à d’autres apports.

Corpus desk

Index FR-crue · crue · French

crue · rank #9,300 · 4 variants · 20 confusables

FREQ-COMMON #9,300
LEN-MID 4 letters
VOW-2 2 vowels
CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
VAR-LOW 4 variants
BOOK-DENSE 8,609
PHOTO-FINISH cuite

Nearest frequency peer: cuite (+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.

coulisses

90,704
country

90,703
crue

90,701
cuite

90,700
cycles

90,699
cyclistes

90,698

What this shows Les barres placent « crue » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

crue vs cul

50% similar

crue vs cup

50% similar

crue vs cut

50% similar

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

Key facts for crue
Property	Value
Headword	crue
Language	French
Part of speech	Noun
IPA	\kʁy\
Letters	4
Frequency rank	#9,300
Misspellings tracked	4
Confusable pairs	20
Source	Wiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « crue »

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

#9,300

#1#100#1K#10K#100K

← used constantlyrarely used →

Les tics avancent en logarithme; chacun est de l'ordre de dix fois plus rare. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « cuite » (#9,301), « country » (#9,298), « cycles » (#9,302). Parmi 8,609 lemmes en « C », « crue » est au #9,300. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for crue is neighbouring look-alikes ("cul", "cup", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced \kʁy\. Frequency #9,300 among 8,609 “C” headwords. 3 recorded senses keep meaning in play.

Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for crue, with forms such as "ccrue", "creu", and "crrue". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "cul", "cup", "cut", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is crue, spelled C-R-U-E.

Definition

1
Augmentation temporaire et généralement rapide du débit ou du niveau d’un cours d’eau, liée aux précipitations, à la fonte des neiges ou à d’autres apports.
2
Augmentation.
3
Croissance.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

La crue, stationnaire alors, paraissait avoir atteint sa plus grande élévation.
Si par malheur les crues de l’Ourthe coïncidaient avec celles de la Meuse, des inondations catastrophiques affectaient toute la vallée en aval de Liège.

Synonyms

grandes eaux

Antonyms

décrue

This word in other languages

flood(English)crecida(Español)enchente(Português)

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

ccrue
creu
crrue
rcue

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

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

Edit distance from "crue"

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 "crue"?

"crue" is spelled C-R-U-E. The IPA pronunciation is \kʁy\.

What does "crue" mean?

As a noun, "crue" means: Augmentation temporaire et généralement rapide du débit ou du niveau d’un cours d’eau, liée aux précipitations, à la fonte des neiges ou à d’autres apports.

What words are commonly confused with "crue"?

"crue" is commonly confused with "cul", "cup", "cut". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.

How do you pronounce "crue"?

The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "crue" is \kʁy\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.

What language does "crue" come from?

"crue" 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 "crue", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 4 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

grey#9,323 hais#9,328 Aude#9,271 Moon#9,350