ou bien
\u bjɛ̃\
The verdict
“ou bien” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as a conjunction. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 7
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Sépare des alternatives, ou exclusif.
Corpus desk
Index FR-ou-bien · ou bien · French
ou bien · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "O" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | ou bien |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Conjunction |
| IPA | \u bjɛ̃\ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « ou bien » en français
Rare enough to double-check
ou bien is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as aconjunction, transcribed \u bjɛ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for ou bien in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. Our dataset records no confusable match here, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct French form is ou bien, spelled O-U- -B-I-E-N.
Definition
- 1Sépare des alternatives, ou exclusif.
- 2Ou non (marqueur de question-tag).
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how ou bien appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Chaque période interglaciaire amène un adoucissement du climat, qui prend le type froid et sec ou bien doux et humide.
Le point commun à tous ces emplois dont le prédicat de dénomination ne rend pas directement compte est que le nom propre ou bien n’y est pas référentiel (exemples (20) à (23)), ou bien y réfère à un objet qui d’une manière ou d’une autre est différent du référent initial (exemple (25)).
Synonyms
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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.