fairway

\fɛʁ.wɛ\

/\fɛʁ.wɛ\/ noun

The verdict

“fairway” is uncommon French (frequency #90,715 among 3,276 “F” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#90,715
frequency rank, French
3,276
“F” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Zone d’un parcours de golf, l’allée, où l’on est censé se placer entre le point de départ (tee) et le trou (sur le green).

Corpus desk

Index FR-fairway · fairway · French

fairway · rank #90,715 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #90,715
  • LEN-LONG 7 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 3,276
  • PHOTO-FINISH falafel

Nearest frequency peer: falafel (+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 « fairway »

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 « fairway » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for fairway
PropertyValue
Headwordfairway
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\fɛʁ.wɛ\
Letters7
Frequency rank#90,715
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « fairway » en français

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.fairwaytombe 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: « falafel » (#90,716), « fadas » (#90,713), « facturations » (#90,712). Parmi 3,276 lemmes en « F », « fairway » est au #90,715. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

fairway is uncommon French at frequency #90,715 among 3,276 “F” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \fɛʁ.wɛ\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Zone d’un parcours de golf, l’allée, où l’on est censé se placer entre le point de départ (tee) et le trou (sur le green).".

We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for fairway, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable French rules. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.

This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct French form is fairway, spelled F-A-I-R-W-A-Y.

Definition

  1. 1
    Zone d’un parcours de golf, l’allée, où l’on est censé se placer entre le point de départ (tee) et le trou (sur le green).

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. La balle a atterri dans le fairway.
  2. Cela ne l’étonnait pas vraiment, car a moins de rechercher une balle perdue -très maladroitement frappée-, peu de joueurs devaient prendre plaisir a se promener dans ces taillis touffus qui bordaient le fairway.

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 "fairway"?
"fairway" is spelled F-A-I-R-W-A-Y. The IPA pronunciation is \fɛʁ.wɛ\.
What does "fairway" mean?
As a noun, "fairway" means: Zone d’un parcours de golf, l’allée, où l’on est censé se placer entre le point de départ (tee) et le trou (sur le green).
How do you pronounce "fairway"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "fairway" is \fɛʁ.wɛ\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "fairway" come from?
"fairway" 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 "fairway", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list