instinct

/\ɛ̃s.tɛ̃\/ noun

Letters

8 characters

Frequency Rank

#7,197

in French word usage

Misspellings

13

tracked variants

Confusables

6

similar word pairs

instinct is aFrenchnoun. It means: Mouvement intérieur qui est naturel aux animaux et qui les fait agir sans le secours de la réflexion pour accomplir des actes conformes à leur espèce et adaptés à leurs besoins. Pronounced \ɛ̃s.tɛ̃\. It ranks #7,197 in French word frequency. Often confused with instit and institut.

Key facts for instinct
PropertyValue
Headwordinstinct
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ɛ̃s.tɛ̃\
Letters8
Frequency rank#7,197
Misspellings tracked13
Confusable pairs6
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of instinct in French word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for instinct is 8 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \ɛ̃s.tɛ̃\. Corpus data places it at rank #7,197 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 13 documented wrong-spelling variants for instinct, with forms such as "innstinct", "insitnct", and "insstinct". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 6 confusable-pair relationships, "instit", "institut", "instincts", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct French form is instinct, spelled I-N-S-T-I-N-C-T, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Mouvement intérieur qui est naturel aux animaux et qui les fait agir sans le secours de la réflexion pour accomplir des actes conformes à leur espèce et adaptés à leurs besoins.
  2. 2
    Mouvement intérieur et involontaire auquel on attribue les actes non réfléchis, les sentiments indélibérés ou, par extension, une grande aptitude, une forte propension à quelque chose, en parlant de l’homme.
  3. 3
    Penchant spontané.

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: innstinct,insitnct,insstinct,insticnt,instincct,instinctt,instinnct,instintc,instnict,insttinct,intsinct,isntinct,nistinct

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for instinct

Misspelling Variants of "instinct"

innstinct9insitnct8insstinct9insticnt8instincct9instinctt9instinnct9instintc8
Misspelling Variants of "instinct"

Frequency rank: #7,197 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "instinct"?
"instinct" is spelled I-N-S-T-I-N-C-T. The IPA pronunciation is \ɛ̃s.tɛ̃\.
What does "instinct" mean?
As a noun, "instinct" means: Mouvement intérieur qui est naturel aux animaux et qui les fait agir sans le secours de la réflexion pour accomplir des actes conformes à leur espèce et adaptés à leurs besoins.
What words are commonly confused with "instinct"?
"instinct" is commonly confused with "instit", "institut", "instincts". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "instinct"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "instinct" is \ɛ̃s.tɛ̃\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "instinct" come from?
"instinct" 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.

Nearby French words

Other entries that begin with the letter I in our French index:

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Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.