ondulation

\ɔ̃.dy.la.sjɔ̃\

/\ɔ̃.dy.la.sjɔ̃\/ noun

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

The verdict

“ondulation” is uncommon French (frequency #66,176 among 1,642 “O” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#66,176
frequency rank, French
1,642
“O” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Mouvement oscillatoire, vibration qui se produit dans l’eau, dont on voit les parties s’élever et s’abaisser alternativement.

Corpus desk

Index FR-ondulation · ondulation · French

ondulation · rank #66,176 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #66,176
  • LEN-MEGA 10 letters
  • VOW-5 5 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 1,642
  • PHOTO-FINISH OMT

Nearest frequency peer: OMT (-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 « ondulation »

Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court

corpus weight

What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « ondulation » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for ondulation
PropertyValue
Headwordondulation
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ɔ̃.dy.la.sjɔ̃\
Letters10
Frequency rank#66,176
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « ondulation » en français

La fréquence va de la poignée de mots du quotidien (gauche) à la longue queue presque jamais vue (droite).ondulationtombe dans cette queue de rareté:

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

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Voisins rares de la même bande: « OMT » (#66,175), « oppressif » (#66,177), « omoplates » (#66,174). Parmi 1,642 lemmes en « O », « ondulation » est au #66,176. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

ondulation is uncommon French at frequency #66,176 among 1,642 “O” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ɔ̃.dy.la.sjɔ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 4 senses are on record.

No misspelling variants are generated for ondulation in our index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.

No documented word history exists for this headword, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is ondulation, spelled O-N-D-U-L-A-T-I-O-N.

Definition

  1. 1
    Mouvement oscillatoire, vibration qui se produit dans l’eau, dont on voit les parties s’élever et s’abaisser alternativement.
  2. 2
    Tout mouvement qui imite celui des ondes.
  3. 3
    Dessin, traits, lignes, ou contours, d’une draperie.
  4. 4
    Mouvements oscillatoires, vibrations concentriques qui animent certains milieux fluides à la manière de l’eau agitée par la chute d’une pierre.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Une pierre jetée dans l’eau y produit des ondulations concentriques.
  2. Le principe est basé sur une ondulation longitudinale d'un feuillard inox en 304 L, un spiralage du feuillard ondulé sur un mandrin donnant le diamètre intérieur souhaité, une soudure en continu du feuillard et un contrôle de la soudure.

This word in other languages

ripple(English)ondulación(Español)Kräuseln(Deutsch)ondulação(Português)

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 "ondulation"?
"ondulation" is spelled O-N-D-U-L-A-T-I-O-N. The IPA pronunciation is \ɔ̃.dy.la.sjɔ̃\.
What does "ondulation" mean?
As a noun, "ondulation" means: Mouvement oscillatoire, vibration qui se produit dans l’eau, dont on voit les parties s’élever et s’abaisser alternativement.
How do you pronounce "ondulation"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "ondulation" is \ɔ̃.dy.la.sjɔ̃\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "ondulation" come from?
"ondulation" 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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

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

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 10 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Ougandaise#66,188naissantes#66,150multimodal#66,135moucherons#66,130

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list