malfaisant
\mal.fə.zɑ̃\
The verdict
“malfaisant” is uncommon French (frequency #51,593 among 5,038 “M” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #51,593
- frequency rank, French
- 5,038
- “M” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Qui se plaît à nuire, à faire du mal à autrui.
Corpus desk
Index FR-malfaisant · malfaisant · French
malfaisant · rank #51,593 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #51,593
- LEN-MEGA 10 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,038
- PHOTO-FINISH magnétophone
Nearest frequency peer: magnétophone (-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 « malfaisant »
Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court
- mafieuse
mafieuse
48,411 corpus weight
- Magdeleine
Magdeleine
48,410 corpus weight
- magnétophone
magnétophone
48,409 corpus weight
- malfaisant
malfaisant
48,408 corpus weight
- malmenée
malmenée
48,407 corpus weight
- manouche
manouche
48,406 corpus weight
What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « malfaisant » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | malfaisant |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | \mal.fə.zɑ̃\ |
| Letters | 10 |
| Frequency rank | #51,593 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « malfaisant » en français
Rare enough to double-check
malfaisant is uncommon French at frequency #51,593 among 5,038 “M” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed \mal.fə.zɑ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
malfaisant doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct French form is malfaisant, spelled M-A-L-F-A-I-S-A-N-T.
Definition
- 1Qui se plaît à nuire, à faire du mal à autrui.
- 2Qualifie les choses nuisibles à la santé.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how malfaisant appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
L'innocence et la pureté de l'âge d'or se corrompant peu à peu, les génies malfaisants inventèrent, comme je l'ai déjà dit, les sciences et les arts.
L’homme, historiquement parlant, a accumulé contre sa compagne tout ce qu’il a pu imaginer de duretés et d’incapacités. Il en a fait une captive, il l’a couverte d’un voile et cachée à l’endroit le plus secret de sa maison, comme une divinité malfaisante ou une esclave suspecte.
Antonyms
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 "malfaisant", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked French headwords with 10 letters (nearest by frequency rank).