opossum
\ɔ.pɔ.sɔm\
The verdict
“opossum” is uncommon French (frequency #77,760 among 1,642 “O” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #77,760
- frequency rank, French
- 1,642
- “O” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Mammifère métathérien d’Amérique de l’ordre Didelphimorphia possédant généralement une longue queue.
Corpus desk
Index FR-opossum · opossum · French
opossum · rank #77,760 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #77,760
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 1,642
- PHOTO-FINISH orchestral
Nearest frequency peer: orchestral (+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 « opossum »
Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court
- officinalis
officinalis
22,243 corpus weight
- opossum
opossum
22,241 corpus weight
- orchestral
orchestral
22,240 corpus weight
- orienta
orienta
22,239 corpus weight
- Ourthe
Ourthe
22,238 corpus weight
- outrées
outrées
22,237 corpus weight
What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « opossum » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | opossum |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \ɔ.pɔ.sɔm\ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #77,760 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « opossum » en français
Rare enough to double-check
opossum is uncommon French at frequency #77,760 among 1,642 “O” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ɔ.pɔ.sɔm\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for opossum, a sign its spelling follows regular French conventions. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct French form is opossum, spelled O-P-O-S-S-U-M.
Definition
- 1Mammifère métathérien d’Amérique de l’ordre Didelphimorphia possédant généralement une longue queue.
- 2Fourrure de cet animal.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how opossum appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
On rencontre l’opossum du Brésil, en Argentine, au Brésil et au Paraguay.
Les placentaires remplacent les marsupiaux, à l’exception des opossums ou sarigues (didelphidés) représentés par plus de soixante-dix espèces, essentiellement en Amérique latine, et quelques espèces ayant réussi à s’implanter vers le nord le long de la côte pacifique et jusqu’en Ontario au Canada.
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
How do you spell "opossum"?
What does "opossum" mean?
How do you pronounce "opossum"?
What language does "opossum" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Similar French words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "opossum", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked French headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).