gorille
\ɡɔ.ʁij\
The verdict
“gorille” is a moderately-common French word, ranked #24,986 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #24,986
- frequency rank, French
- 7
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 9
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Grand singe de la famille des hominidés dont la forme se rapproche le plus de celle de l’être humain et qu’on trouve dans plusieurs pays d’Afrique.
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 | gorille |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \ɡɔ.ʁij\ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #24,986 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 9 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “gorille” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for gorille is 7 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \ɡɔ.ʁij\. Corpus data places it at rank #24,986 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for gorille, with forms such as "ggorille", "goirlle", and "gorile". 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 9 confusable-pair relationships, "grill", "Grille", "griller", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct French form is gorille, spelled G-O-R-I-L-L-E.
Definition
- 1Grand singe de la famille des hominidés dont la forme se rapproche le plus de celle de l’être humain et qu’on trouve dans plusieurs pays d’Afrique.
- 2Homme grand et fort.
- 3Garde du corps.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ggorille,goirlle,gorile,gorilel,gorlile,gorrille,groille,ogrille
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of gorille - 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
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Using “gorille”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is G-O-R-I-L-L-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \ɡɔ.ʁij\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “grill” - see the side-by-side comparison. gorille vs grill
- 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.