dérive
\de.ʁiv\
The verdict
“dérive” is a regularly-used French word, ranked #7,052 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #7,052
- frequency rank, French
- 6
- letters
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Écart, déviation entre le cap effectivement suivi par un navire ou un aéroplane et le cap initialement fixé.
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 | dérive |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \de.ʁiv\ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #7,052 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “dérive” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for dérive is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \de.ʁiv\. Corpus data places it at rank #7,052 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 9 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for dérive, with forms such as "ddérive", "derive", and "dréive". 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, "dive", "drive", "doive", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
No documented word history exists for this headword, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct French form is dérive, spelled D-É-R-I-V-E.
Definition
- 1Écart, déviation entre le cap effectivement suivi par un navire ou un aéroplane et le cap initialement fixé.
- 2Angle que la quille du bâtiment fait avec la direction réelle de sa route.
- 3Déplacement en mer, au gré du vent et des courants, en parlant des glaces ou des varechs.
- 4Mauvaise direction, mauvaise pente.
- 5Élément fixe ou mobile d'un bateau permettant de réduire les déplacements du bateau dans la direction perpendiculaire à son plan de symétrie, à la différence du gouvernail, qui est destiné à permettre le changement de cap.
- 6Aileron situé sous la planche de surf, et qui sert la stabiliser.
- 7Empennage vertical qui comporte une partie mobile qui a la même fonction que le gouvernail sur un navire.
- 8Action, en particulier politique, qui diffère de celle annoncée par ceux qui la mènent.
- 9Tendance des abeilles à retourner à la mauvaise ruche à la fin d’un vol.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ddérive,derive,dréive,déirve,dériev,dérivve,dérrive,dérvie,édrive
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of dérive - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 "dérive"?
What does "dérive" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "dérive"?
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Using “dérive”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is D-É-R-I-V-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \de.ʁiv\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “dive” - see the side-by-side comparison. dérive vs dive
- 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.