mal tourner

\mal tuʁ.ne\

/\mal tuʁ.ne\/ verb

The verdict

“mal tourner” is outside the top-ranked French vocabulary, used as a verb - the kind of word writers most often double-check.

Unranked
below top-frequency French
11
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Changer défavorablement, contrairement à ce qui était attendu.

Key facts for mal tourner
PropertyValue
Headwordmal tourner
LanguageFrench
Part of speechVerb
IPA\mal tuʁ.ne\
Letters11
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “mal tourner” sits in French frequency

mal tourner falls outside the top-100,000 ranked French words, the long-tail zone of technical, archaic, or low-frequency vocabulary, exactly where readers second-guess spellings most.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for mal tourner is 11 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \mal tuʁ.ne\. 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: "Changer défavorablement, contrairement à ce qui était attendu.".

No misspelling variants are generated for mal tourner in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

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 mal tourner, spelled M-A-L- -T-O-U-R-N-E-R, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Changer défavorablement, contrairement à ce qui était attendu.

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.

Cite this page

Free to reuse with attribution (CC BY-SA). Copy the citation:

PlainSpell, “mal tourner, French word data” (May 6, 2026). Derived from Wiktionary (kaikki.org, CC BY-SA) and an open word-frequency list. https://plainspell.com/fr/mot/mal-tourner

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "mal tourner"?
"mal tourner" is spelled M-A-L- -T-O-U-R-N-E-R. The IPA pronunciation is \mal tuʁ.ne\.
What does "mal tourner" mean?
As a verb, "mal tourner" means: Changer défavorablement, contrairement à ce qui était attendu.
How do you pronounce "mal tourner"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "mal tourner" is \mal tuʁ.ne\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "mal tourner" come from?
"mal tourner" 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.

Using “mal tourner”

The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.

  • The one correct French spelling is M-A-L- -T-O-U-R-N-E-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
  • Say it as \mal tuʁ.ne\ (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

Nearby French words

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

Explore PlainSpell

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.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list