scarcely
\ˈskɛɹs.li\
The verdict
“scarcely” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adverb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Guère, à peine.
Corpus desk
Index FR-scarcely · scarcely · French
scarcely · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "S" 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 | scarcely |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adverb |
| IPA | \ˈskɛɹs.li\ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « scarcely » en français
Rare enough to double-check
scarcely is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as anadverb, transcribed \ˈskɛɹs.li\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Guère, à peine.".
No misspelling variants are generated for scarcely in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable French rules. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct French form is scarcely, spelled S-C-A-R-C-E-L-Y.
Definition
- 1Guère, à peine.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how scarcely appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The British supermarket chain Waitrose - which releases very detailed sales figures - is selling 13% more pumpkin carving kits, 21% more decorations and a scarcely credible 676% more large pumpkins than last year.
Dogs, undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely better; splashed to their very blinkers.
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.