harsh
\hɑːɹʃ\
The verdict
“harsh” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 5
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Âpre, dur.
Corpus desk
Index FR-harsh · harsh · French
harsh · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "H" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | harsh |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | \hɑːɹʃ\ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « harsh » en français
Rare enough to double-check
harsh is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective, transcribed \hɑːɹʃ\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
No misspelling variants are generated for harsh in our index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Our source data has no etymology on file for this entry, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is harsh, spelled H-A-R-S-H.
Definition
- 1Âpre, dur.
- 2Sévère, cruel.
- 3Rude.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how harsh appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Bernard Madoff, (…) will likely serve his time in a harsher prison than those white-collar inmates.
It’s a harsh world.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.