piquant

\pi.kɑ̃\

/\pi.kɑ̃\/ adj

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

The verdict

“piquant” has 10 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #22,031. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#22,031
frequency rank, French
6,826
“P” headwords
10
tracked misspellings
6
confusable pairs

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

Corpus desk

Index FR-piquant · piquant · French

piquant · rank #22,031 · 10 variants · 6 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #22,031
  • LEN-LONG 7 letters
  • VOW-3 3 vowels
  • CONFUS-MID 6 pairs
  • VAR-MID 10 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,826
  • PHOTO-FINISH personnalisée

Nearest frequency peer: personnalisée (-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.

Pairs de rang près de l'aimant d'erreurs « piquant »

Même bande de rareté: utile si une faute tombe sur un lemme voisin

corpus weight

What this shows « piquant » siège parmi ces pairs FrequencyWords; la profondeur des fautes est suivie à part dans le graphique d'édition.

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).

piquant vs puant
71% similar
piquant vs piquet
71% similar
piquant vs piquent
86% similar

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

Key facts for piquant
PropertyValue
Headwordpiquant
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdjective
IPA\pi.kɑ̃\
Letters7
Frequency rank#22,031
Misspellings tracked10
Confusable pairs6
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Fréquence de l'aimant d'erreurs « piquant »

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

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

L'axe est logarithmique: chaque tic marque environ dix fois moins de fréquence. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « personnalisée » (#22,030), « placebo » (#22,032), « Person » (#22,029). Parmi 6,826 lemmes en « P », « piquant » est au #22,031. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 10 spelling variants around piquant (IPA \pi.kɑ̃\), anadjective. Corpus frequency is #22,031 among 6,826 “P” headwords. Wiktionary lists 7 senses, so context still picks the gloss.

Our generated misspelling index lists 10 likely wrong-spelling variants for piquant, with forms such as "ipquant", "piqaunt", and "piqquant". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 6 confusable-pair relationships, "puant", "piquet", "piquent", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.

This entry's etymology isn't recorded, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct French form is piquant, spelled P-I-Q-U-A-N-T.

Definition

  1. 1
    Qui pique.
  2. 2
    Qui fait une impression vive sur l’organe du goût ou de l’odorat.
  3. 3
    Stimulant comme le piment et le gingembre.
  4. 4
    Qualifie la température, quand elle est très froide.
  5. 5
    Qui est offensant, en parlant principalement des discours.
  6. 6
    Qualifie ce qui fait une impression vive et agréable sur l’esprit, sur les sens, et particulièrement des discours, des écrits et des ouvrages d’art qui plaisent par quelque chose de fin et de vif.
  7. 7
    Se dit des personnes qui plaisent par la vivacité et par l’agrément de leur physionomie plus que par la régularité de leurs traits.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Les branches des rosiers sont piquantes.
  2. Les orties sont piquantes.

Synonyms

mordant

This word in other languages

piquant(English)picante(Español)scharf(Deutsch)picante(Português)

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • ipquant
  • piqaunt
  • piqquant
  • piquannt
  • piquantt
  • piquatn
  • piqunat
  • piuqant
  • ppiquant
  • pqiuant

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of piquant - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.

ipquant2piqaunt2piqquant1piquannt1piquantt1piquatn2piqunat2piuqant2
Edit distance from "piquant"

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 "piquant"?
"piquant" is spelled P-I-Q-U-A-N-T. The IPA pronunciation is \pi.kɑ̃\.
What does "piquant" mean?
As an adjective, "piquant" means: Qui pique.
What words are commonly confused with "piquant"?
"piquant" is commonly confused with "puant", "piquet", "piquent". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "piquant"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "piquant" is \pi.kɑ̃\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "piquant" come from?
"piquant" 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 "piquant", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

placebo#22,032pléiade#22,034popcorn#22,036prévaut#22,046

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (10 here; floor ≥5).

Putsch10 variantsMuhammad10 variantspétard10 variantsMorrison10 variants

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list