importun
\ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tœ̃\
The verdict
“importun” is uncommon French (frequency #76,674 among 3,561 “I” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #76,674
- frequency rank, French
- 3,561
- “I” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Qui déplaît, qui ennuie, qui fatigue par des assiduités, par des discours, par des demandes, par une présence hors de propos, etc.
Corpus desk
Index FR-importun · importun · French
importun · rank #76,674 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #76,674
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,561
- PHOTO-FINISH improvement
Nearest frequency peer: improvement (+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 « importun »
Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court
- imager
imager
23,330 corpus weight
- immunologiq…
immunologique
23,329 corpus weight
- importun
importun
23,327 corpus weight
- improvement
improvement
23,326 corpus weight
- improvisate…
improvisateur
23,325 corpus weight
- impulsée
impulsée
23,324 corpus weight
What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « importun » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | importun |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | \ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tœ̃\ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #76,674 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « importun » en français
Rare enough to double-check
importun is uncommon French at frequency #76,674 among 3,561 “I” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed \ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tœ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for importun, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct French form is importun, spelled I-M-P-O-R-T-U-N.
Definition
- 1Qui déplaît, qui ennuie, qui fatigue par des assiduités, par des discours, par des demandes, par une présence hors de propos, etc.
- 2Qui déplait, qui fatigue parce que cela est, ou semble, hors de propos.
- 3ou Qui est insupportable par sa continuité, sa fréquence.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how importun appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Quoique très instruite, elle n'avoit ni les caprices, ni l’humeur qu'on attribue aux gens de lettres, qui tantôt se livrent à une loquacité importune, tantôt se renferment dans un silence méprisant.
Un torse rond, des épaules droites, des seins gorgés comme des pastèques, des jambes longues et bien en chair se délivrèrent agilement d'un linge multiple importun.
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
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Similar French words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "importun", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked French headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).