pur
\pyʁ\
The verdict
“pur” is a regularly-used French word, ranked #3,034 in French word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #3,034
- frequency rank, French
- 3
- letters
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Qui est sans mélange, en parlant d’un produit, d’une émotion.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | pur |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | \pyʁ\ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #3,034 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “pur” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for pur is 3 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \pyʁ\. Corpus data places it at rank #3,034 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 10 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Zero misspellings are on record for pur in our index, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "PV", "Py", "px", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
No documented word history exists for this headword, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct French form is pur, spelled P-U-R.
Definition
- 1Qui est sans mélange, en parlant d’un produit, d’une émotion.
- 2Qui n’est pas altéré, vicié, corrompu ou souillé, en parlant d'un élément physique ou en parlant d'une personne, de ses émotions ou de ses attributs.
- 3Désigne l’état de l’homme tel qu’on le suppose antérieurement à toute civilisation.
- 4Abstrait, fondamental. Antonyme : appliqué.
- 5Absolu, sans mélange, s’emploie pour donner plus de force à la signification des mots auxquels on l’associe. Alors il précède ordinairement le nom mais il le suit, quand il est précédé lui-même du mot tout qui ajoute encore à son énergie.
- 6Il est quelquefois suivi de la particule de, tant au sens propre qu’au figuré.
- 7Propre, régulier, bien construit, en parlant de style.
- 8Net, exact, correctement tracé, en parlant de dessin.
- 9Qui ne consiste que dans le seul émail du champ de l’écu, sans aucune pièce héraldique. Synonyme : plein.
- 10Qui est composé à au moins 80 % d’une seule essence.
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); 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
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Using “pur”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is P-U-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \pyʁ\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “PV” - see the side-by-side comparison. pur vs PV
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.