défaillants
\de.fa.jɑ̃\
The verdict
“défaillants” is uncommon French (frequency #53,282 among 5,307 “D” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #53,282
- frequency rank, French
- 5,307
- “D” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Masculin pluriel de défaillant.
Corpus desk
Index FR-defaillants · défaillants · French
défaillants · rank #53,282 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #53,282
- LEN-MEGA 11 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,307
- PHOTO-FINISH défit
Nearest frequency peer: défit (+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.
Rangs de longue queue près de « défaillants »
Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court
- décentes
décentes
46,723 corpus weight
- décernées
décernées
46,722 corpus weight
- déclassés
déclassés
46,721 corpus weight
- défaillants
défaillants
46,719 corpus weight
- défit
défit
46,718 corpus weight
- délecte
délecte
46,716 corpus weight
What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « défaillants » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | défaillants |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | \de.fa.jɑ̃\ |
| Letters | 11 |
| Frequency rank | #53,282 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « défaillants » en français
Rare enough to double-check
défaillants is uncommon French at frequency #53,282 among 5,307 “D” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed \de.fa.jɑ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Masculin pluriel de défaillant.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for défaillants, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct French form is défaillants, spelled D-É-F-A-I-L-L-A-N-T-S.
Definition
- 1Masculin pluriel de défaillant.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how défaillants appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Car la mode, c’est aussi les millions de tonnes de crèmes, poudres, laits, lotions, maquillages, démaquillants, prémaquillants, produits à se peindre, à se bronzer, à ôter la peinture, à s’oindre, à s’enduire, à se désenduire, à se pommader, à se friser, à s’onduler, à se défriser, à nourrir les cheveux, les laver, les traiter, les dépelliculer, les blond…
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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Similar French words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "défaillants", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked French headwords with 11 letters (nearest by frequency rank).