rectitude
\ʁɛk.ti.tyd\
The verdict
“rectitude” is a moderately-common French word, ranked #39,495 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #39,495
- frequency rank, French
- 9
- letters
- 13
- tracked misspellings
- 2
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Conformité à la règle droite, aux vrais principes, à la saine raison.
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 | rectitude |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \ʁɛk.ti.tyd\ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #39,495 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 2 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “rectitude” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for rectitude is 9 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \ʁɛk.ti.tyd\. Corpus data places it at rank #39,495 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 13 likely wrong-spelling variants for rectitude, with forms such as "erctitude", "rcetitude", and "recctitude". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 2 confusable-pair relationships, "restitué", "restituée", since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is rectitude, spelled R-E-C-T-I-T-U-D-E.
Definition
- 1Conformité à la règle droite, aux vrais principes, à la saine raison.
- 2Qualité de ce qui est droit.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: erctitude,rcetitude,recctitude,recittude,rectitdue,rectittude,rectitudde,rectitued,rectiutde,recttitude,recttiude,retcitude,rrectitude
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of rectitude - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 "rectitude"?
What does "rectitude" mean?
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Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “rectitude”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is R-E-C-T-I-T-U-D-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \ʁɛk.ti.tyd\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “restitué” - see the side-by-side comparison. rectitude vs restitué
- 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.