ripou

\ʁi.pu\

/\ʁi.pu\/ noun

The verdict

“ripou” is uncommon French (frequency #84,259 among 5,742 “R” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#84,259
frequency rank, French
5,742
“R” headwords

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

Corpus desk

Index FR-ripou · ripou · French

ripou · rank #84,259 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #84,259
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-3 3 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 5,742
  • PHOTO-FINISH riziculture

Nearest frequency peer: riziculture (+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 « ripou »

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

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for ripou
PropertyValue
Headwordripou
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\ʁi.pu\
Letters5
Frequency rank#84,259
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « ripou » en français

Cette échelle va du noyau du français courant (gauche) jusqu'à la traîne des formes rares (droite).ripoutombe dans cette queue de rareté:

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

L'axe est logarithmique: chaque tic marque environ dix fois moins de fréquence. Voisins rares de la même bande: « riziculture » (#84,260), « rigolera » (#84,257), « rigidités » (#84,256). Parmi 5,742 lemmes en « R », « ripou » est au #84,259. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

ripou is uncommon French at frequency #84,259 among 5,742 “R” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \ʁi.pu\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

ripou has no tracked misspelling variants, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is ripou, spelled R-I-P-O-U.

Definition

  1. 1
    Personnage corrompu.
  2. 2
    Policier corrompu.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Il est un peu écolo, un peu don Quichotte, du genre à militer contre un tunnel dans les Pyrénées pour sauver des ours, mais c'est aussi un pourfendeur de la corruption en politique, redoutable quel que soit le bord des ripous !
  2. Des ripoux rackettant des gens désespérés ou enragés d’attendre, en vain, un logement, c’est récurrent, et personne ne semble avoir la clé…

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 "ripou"?
"ripou" is spelled R-I-P-O-U. The IPA pronunciation is \ʁi.pu\.
What does "ripou" mean?
As a noun, "ripou" means: Personnage corrompu.
How do you pronounce "ripou"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "ripou" is \ʁi.pu\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "ripou" come from?
"ripou" is a French word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
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 "ripou", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list