patchouli

\pat.ʃu.li\

/\pat.ʃu.li\/ noun

The verdict

“patchouli” is uncommon French (frequency #72,600 among 6,826 “P” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#72,600
frequency rank, French
6,826
“P” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Nom usuel de Pogostemon cablin, plante herbacée de la famille des Lamiacées originaire d’Inde et du sud del’Asie, remarquable par son odeur aromatique.

Corpus desk

Index FR-patchouli · patchouli · French

patchouli · rank #72,600 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #72,600
  • LEN-LONG 9 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,826
  • PHOTO-FINISH passantes

Nearest frequency peer: passantes (-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 « patchouli »

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 « patchouli » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for patchouli
PropertyValue
Headwordpatchouli
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\pat.ʃu.li\
Letters9
Frequency rank#72,600
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « patchouli » en français

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).patchoulitombe 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: « passantes » (#72,599), « Paulet » (#72,601), « payeras » (#72,602). Parmi 6,826 lemmes en « P », « patchouli » est au #72,600. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

patchouli is uncommon French at frequency #72,600 among 6,826 “P” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \pat.ʃu.li\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

Zero misspellings are on record for patchouli in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable French patterns. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct French form is patchouli, spelled P-A-T-C-H-O-U-L-I.

Definition

  1. 1
    Nom usuel de Pogostemon cablin, plante herbacée de la famille des Lamiacées originaire d’Inde et du sud del’Asie, remarquable par son odeur aromatique.
  2. 2
    Parfum extrait des feuilles et des tiges de cette plante.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Pastilles de patchouli.
  2. Dans l’air moite, dans la fadeur exhalée des cuvettes, traînait par instant une odeur plus aiguë, quelques brins de patchouli sec, brisés menu au fond d’une coupe.

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 "patchouli"?
"patchouli" is spelled P-A-T-C-H-O-U-L-I. The IPA pronunciation is \pat.ʃu.li\.
What does "patchouli" mean?
As a noun, "patchouli" means: Nom usuel de Pogostemon cablin, plante herbacée de la famille des Lamiacées originaire d’Inde et du sud del’Asie, remarquable par son odeur aromatique.
How do you pronounce "patchouli"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "patchouli" is \pat.ʃu.li\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "patchouli" come from?
"patchouli" 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 "patchouli", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 9 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list