now

\ˈnaʊ\

/\ˈnaʊ\/ adv

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“now” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #8,278) as an adverb. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#8,278
frequency rank, French
1,563
“N” headwords
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Maintenant.

Corpus desk

Index FR-now · now · French

now · rank #8,278 · 0 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-COMMON #8,278
  • LEN-MID 3 letters
  • VOW-1 1 vowel
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 1,563
  • PHOTO-FINISH nie

Nearest frequency peer: nie (-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.

Voisins de fréquence du confusable « now »

Pairs de poids proche dans le corpus, séparés des confusables ci-dessous

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « now » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

now vs nu
33% similar
now vs ny
33% similar
now vs NS
0% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for now
PropertyValue
Headwordnow
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdverb
IPA\ˈnaʊ\
Letters3
Frequency rank#8,278
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « now »

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).nowse place ici:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Les tics avancent en logarithme; chacun est de l'ordre de dix fois plus rare. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « nie » (#8,277), « ordi » (#8,279), « molécules » (#8,276). Parmi 1,563 lemmes en « N », « now » est au #8,278. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for now is neighbouring look-alikes ("nu", "ny", …), not just typos; it is anadverb pronounced \ˈnaʊ\. Frequency #8,278 among 1,563 “N” headwords. 4 recorded senses keep meaning in play.

The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for now, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "nu", "ny", "NS", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is now, spelled N-O-W.

Definition

  1. 1
    Maintenant.
  2. 2
    Désormais.
  3. 3
    Introduit un nouveau sujet; or
  4. 4
    Indique un moment de commencer quelque chose

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how now appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. I live in France now.
  2. It used to be like that, but things have changed now.

Synonyms

at presentat this moment in timecurrentlyimmediately

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 "now"?
"now" is spelled N-O-W. The IPA pronunciation is \ˈnaʊ\.
What does "now" mean?
As an adverb, "now" means: Maintenant.
What words are commonly confused with "now"?
"now" is commonly confused with "nu", "ny", "NS". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "now"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "now" is \ˈnaʊ\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "now" come from?
"now" is a French word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "now", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

nie#8,277pau#8,284jai#8,259get#8,248

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list