écureuil
\e.ky.ʁœj\
The verdict
“écureuil” is a moderately-common French word, ranked #20,895 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #20,895
- frequency rank, French
- 8
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 2
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Petit mammifère rongeur et arboricole doué d’une grande agilité et remarquable par sa queue touffue qui se relève en panache.
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 | écureuil |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \e.ky.ʁœj\ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #20,895 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 2 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “écureuil” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for écureuil is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \e.ky.ʁœj\. Corpus data places it at rank #20,895 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 10 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for écureuil, with forms such as "céureuil", "ecureuil", and "éccureuil". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 2 confusable-pair relationships, "écureuils", "écueil", a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is écureuil, spelled É-C-U-R-E-U-I-L.
Definition
- 1Petit mammifère rongeur et arboricole doué d’une grande agilité et remarquable par sa queue touffue qui se relève en panache.
- 2Personne prévoyante par analogie avec un comportement de l’animal.
- 3Caténairiste.
- 4Personne vive, active, qui ne tient pas en place.
- 5Synonyme de bombyx du hêtre.
- 6Sorte d’indicateur pour avertir des touches dans la pêche aux carpes et aux silures.
- 7Ancien nom vernaculaire du serran de sable (Diplectrum formosum, L. 1766), poisson des zones tropicales américaines atlantiques.
- 8Meuble représentant l’animal du même nom dans les armoiries. Il est généralement représenté rampant, la queue le long du dos. À rapprocher de bièvre, castor, connil, lapin et lièvre.
- 9Pompier ou secouriste qui a pour rôle de maintenir l’axe tête-cou-tronc de la victime lors d’une manœuvre de désincarcération, parfois à l’aide d’un collier cervical.
- 10Militant dont l’action consiste à se confiner dans un arbre et n’acceptant d’en descendre qu’une fois sa cause entendue.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: céureuil,ecureuil,éccureuil,écrueuil,écueruil,écureiul,écureuill,écureuli,écurreuil,écurueil,éucreuil
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of écureuil - 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 "écureuil"?
What does "écureuil" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "écureuil"?
How do you pronounce "écureuil"?
What language does "écureuil" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “écureuil”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is É-C-U-R-E-U-I-L - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \e.ky.ʁœj\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “écureuils” - see the side-by-side comparison. écureuil vs écureuils
- 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.