hors pair
^((h aspiré))\ɔʁ pɛʁ\
The verdict
“hors pair” is outside the top-ranked French vocabulary, used as an adjective - the kind of word writers most often double-check.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Sans égal, exceptionnel.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | hors pair |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | ^((h aspiré))\ɔʁ pɛʁ\ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “hors pair” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for hors pair is 9 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as ^((h aspiré))\ɔʁ pɛʁ\. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Sans égal, exceptionnel.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for hors pair, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct French form is hors pair, spelled H-O-R-S- -P-A-I-R.
Definition
- 1Sans égal, exceptionnel.
Synonyms
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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “hors pair”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is H-O-R-S- -P-A-I-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as ^((h aspiré))\ɔʁ pɛʁ\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- 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.