retenir son souffle
\ʁə.tə.niʁ sɔ̃ sufl\
The verdict
“retenir son souffle” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 19
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - S’arrêter temporairement et volontairement de respirer.
Corpus desk
Index FR-retenir-son-souffle · retenir son souffle · French
retenir son souffle · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 19 letters
- VOW-7 7 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "R" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | retenir son souffle |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | \ʁə.tə.niʁ sɔ̃ sufl\ |
| Letters | 19 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “retenir son souffle” sits in French frequency
Rare enough to double-check
retenir son souffle is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as averb, transcribed \ʁə.tə.niʁ sɔ̃ sufl\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
retenir son souffle has no tracked misspelling variants, a sign its spelling follows regular French conventions. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, 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 retenir son souffle, spelled R-E-T-E-N-I-R- -S-O-N- -S-O-U-F-F-L-E.
Definition
- 1S’arrêter temporairement et volontairement de respirer.
- 2Attendre sans rien dire tout en étant impatient, anxieux ou angoissé.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how retenir son souffle appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Le métis retint son souffle. Ce type avait prononcé deux fois « gold », et ce mot était suffisamment proche du mot « goud » en afrikaans – l’or – pour qu’il y prêtât attention.
Les deux vieux, retenant leur souffle, ne comprenant rien à ce manège, épiaient anxieusement ses moindres jeux de physionomie, cherchant à lire sur son visage.
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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of September 3, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
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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.