hum

^((h aspiré))\œm\

/^((h aspiré))\œm\/ intj

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“hum” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #5,875) as an interjection. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#5,875
frequency rank, French
1,969
“H” headwords
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Interjection qui marque doute, réticence, impatience.

Corpus desk

Index FR-hum · hum · French

hum · rank #5,875 · 0 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-COMMON #5,875
  • LEN-MID 3 letters
  • VOW-1 1 vowel
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 1,969
  • PHOTO-FINISH huitième

Nearest frequency peer: huitième (-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.

Voisins de fréquence du confusable « hum »

Pairs de poids proche dans le corpus, séparés des confusables ci-dessous

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « hum » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

hum vs Hz
0% similar
hum vs hy
33% similar
hum vs Hut
33% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for hum
PropertyValue
Headwordhum
LanguageFrench
Part of speechInterjection
IPA^((h aspiré))\œm\
Letters3
Frequency rank#5,875
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « hum »

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.humse place ici:

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

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « huitième » (#5,874), « injuste » (#5,876), « horaire » (#5,873). Parmi 1,969 lemmes en « H », « hum » est au #5,875. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for hum is neighbouring look-alikes ("Hz", "hy", …), not just typos; it is aninterjection pronounced ^((h aspiré))\œm\. Frequency #5,875 among 1,969 “H” headwords. 2 recorded senses keep meaning in play.

Zero misspellings are on record for hum in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "Hz", "hy", "Hut", 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, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is hum, spelled H-U-M.

Definition

  1. 1
    Interjection qui marque doute, réticence, impatience.
  2. 2
    Marque d’un certain plaisir à ressentir quelque chose, odeurs, sensations, etc. Notes : dans ce cas se prononce généralement différemment ^((h aspiré))\œ:m\.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. La comtesse : Allez porter ma lettre. — Lisette à part : Hum ! il y a ici quelque chose.
  2. Cet argument sans réplique produisit une espèce de hum ! d’acquiescement de la part du Saxon […]

Synonyms

heu

This word in other languages

ahem(English)

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 "hum"?
"hum" is spelled H-U-M. The IPA pronunciation is ^((h aspiré))\œm\.
What does "hum" mean?
As an interjection, "hum" means: Interjection qui marque doute, réticence, impatience.
What words are commonly confused with "hum"?
"hum" is commonly confused with "Hz", "hy", "Hut". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "hum"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "hum" is ^((h aspiré))\œm\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "hum" come from?
"hum" is a French word. PlainSpell covers definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German.
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 "hum", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

fun#5,870rap#5,913PME#5,800gré#5,767

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list