empennage

\ɑ̃.pɛ.naʒ\

/\ɑ̃.pɛ.naʒ\/ noun

The verdict

“empennage” is uncommon French (frequency #93,729 among 3,255 “E” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#93,729
frequency rank, French
3,255
“E” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Plan fixe qui assure la stabilité en tangage et en trajectoire (ou stabilité en lacet) d’un aérodyne.

Corpus desk

Index FR-empennage · empennage · French

empennage · rank #93,729 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #93,729
  • LEN-LONG 9 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 3,255
  • PHOTO-FINISH empanadas

Nearest frequency peer: empanadas (-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 « empennage »

Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court

corpus weight

What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « empennage » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for empennage
PropertyValue
Headwordempennage
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ɑ̃.pɛ.naʒ\
Letters9
Frequency rank#93,729
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « empennage » en français

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).empennagetombe dans cette queue de rareté:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Voisins rares de la même bande: « empanadas » (#93,728), « encensoir » (#93,730), « emmêler » (#93,727). Parmi 3,255 lemmes en « E », « empennage » est au #93,729. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

empennage is uncommon French at frequency #93,729 among 3,255 “E” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ɑ̃.pɛ.naʒ\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

No generated misspelling entries exist for empennage in our index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.

No documented word history exists for this headword, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is empennage, spelled E-M-P-E-N-N-A-G-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Plan fixe qui assure la stabilité en tangage et en trajectoire (ou stabilité en lacet) d’un aérodyne.
  2. 2
    Ensemble de plusieurs plans fixes qui assurent une rotation stable à une flèche, obus ou autre projectile, afin de stabiliser sa trajectoire.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Tout semblablement, nous pouvons nous rendre compte de l’influence de l’inclinaison de l’empennage horizontal d’avant sur la valeur du couple aérodynamique.
  2. L’empennage d’une flèche est composé la plupart du temps de 3 plumes.

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

How do you spell "empennage"?
"empennage" is spelled E-M-P-E-N-N-A-G-E. The IPA pronunciation is \ɑ̃.pɛ.naʒ\.
What does "empennage" mean?
As a noun, "empennage" means: Plan fixe qui assure la stabilité en tangage et en trajectoire (ou stabilité en lacet) d’un aérodyne.
How do you pronounce "empennage"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "empennage" is \ɑ̃.pɛ.naʒ\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "empennage" come from?
"empennage" is a French word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
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 "empennage", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 9 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list