mérite
\me.ʁit\
The verdict
“mérite” has 9 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #1,395. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #1,395
- frequency rank, French
- 202,672
- “M” headwords
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Ce qui rend une personne digne d’estime.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | mérite |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \me.ʁit\ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #1,395 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “mérite” sits in French frequency
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 9 spelling variants around mérite (IPA \me.ʁit\), anoun. Corpus frequency is #1,395 among 202,672 “M” headwords. Wiktionary lists 4 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for mérite, with forms such as "merite", "mmérite", and "mréite". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "morte", "mette", "meute", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
No documented word history exists for this headword, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is mérite, spelled M-É-R-I-T-E.
Definition
- 1Ce qui rend une personne digne d’estime.
- 2Ce que les choses ont de bon et d’estimable.
- 3Ce qui rend Dieu miséricordieux pour ses fidèles.
- 4Les souffrances et la mort de Jésus-Christ, les bonnes œuvres des saints, en tant qu’elles ont satisfait, pour les adeptes, à la justice divine.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: merite,mmérite,mréite,méirte,mériet,méritte,mérrite,mértie,émrite
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of mérite - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 "mérite"?
What does "mérite" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "mérite"?
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Using “mérite”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is M-É-R-I-T-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \me.ʁit\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “morte” - see the side-by-side comparison. mérite vs morte
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Same frequency band
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.