quinine

\ki.nin\

/\ki.nin\/ noun

The verdict

“quinine” is uncommon French (frequency #65,440 among 352 “Q” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#65,440
frequency rank, French
352
“Q” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Alcaloïde végétal extrait en particulier du quinquina jaune (Cinchona calisaya). On l'utilise ainsi que ses dérivés pour lutter contre le paludisme, l’industrie alimentaire l'’utilise aussi.

Corpus desk

Index FR-quinine · quinine · French

quinine · rank #65,440 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #65,440
  • LEN-LONG 7 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 352
  • PHOTO-FINISH Quintin

Nearest frequency peer: Quintin (+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 « quinine »

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

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for quinine
PropertyValue
Headwordquinine
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ki.nin\
Letters7
Frequency rank#65,440
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « quinine » en français

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.quininetombe dans cette queue de rareté:

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

Les tics avancent en logarithme; chacun est de l'ordre de dix fois plus rare. Voisins rares de la même bande: « Quintin » (#65,441), « pétrie » (#65,438), « périra » (#65,437). Parmi 352 lemmes en « Q », « quinine » est au #65,440. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

quinine is uncommon French at frequency #65,440 among 352 “Q” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ki.nin\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Alcaloïde végétal extrait en particulier du quinquina jaune (Cinchona calisaya). On l'utilise ainsi que ses dérivés pour lutter contre le paludisme, l’industrie alimentaire l'’utilise aussi.".

No misspelling variants are generated for quinine in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

This entry's etymology isn't recorded, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is quinine, spelled Q-U-I-N-I-N-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Alcaloïde végétal extrait en particulier du quinquina jaune (Cinchona calisaya). On l'utilise ainsi que ses dérivés pour lutter contre le paludisme, l’industrie alimentaire l'’utilise aussi.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. — Elle m’a donné une drogue et j’ai eu le délire toutes les nuits, elle disait que c’était de la quinine ; je l’aurais bien retenue, seulement la poigne m’a manqué.
  2. La poudre de quinquina mélangée de chaux, est agitée avec des huiles lourdes de pétrole qui dissolvent la quinine.

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 "quinine"?
"quinine" is spelled Q-U-I-N-I-N-E. The IPA pronunciation is \ki.nin\.
What does "quinine" mean?
As a noun, "quinine" means: Alcaloïde végétal extrait en particulier du quinquina jaune (Cinchona calisaya). On l'utilise ainsi que ses dérivés pour lutter contre le paludisme, l’industrie alimentaire l'’utilise aussi.
How do you pronounce "quinine"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "quinine" is \ki.nin\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "quinine" come from?
"quinine" 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 "quinine", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

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

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list