serrer les dents
\sɛ.ʁe le dɑ̃\
The verdict
“serrer les dents” is uncommon French (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 16
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Serrer les mâchoires pour faire face à la douleur.
Corpus desk
Index FR-serrer-les-dents · serrer les dents · French
serrer les dents · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 16 letters
- VOW-4 4 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 | serrer les dents |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | \sɛ.ʁe le dɑ̃\ |
| Letters | 16 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Longue queue: rang de « serrer les dents » en français
Rare enough to double-check
serrer les dents is uncommon French outside the top frequency list, classed as averb, transcribed \sɛ.ʁe le dɑ̃\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for serrer les dents in our index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, 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 serrer les dents, spelled S-E-R-R-E-R- -L-E-S- -D-E-N-T-S.
Definition
- 1Serrer les mâchoires pour faire face à la douleur.
- 2Se préparer à faire face à une souffrance, une difficulté.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how serrer les dents appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Le docteur Martineau désinfecta la plaie, la referma. Albert eut un mal de chien et serra les dents.
Quand ma mère recevait des amies, je refusais d’aller au salon ; parfois elle s’emportait, je cédais : mais je restais assise au bord de ma chaise les dents serrées, avec un air si furibond qu’elle me renvoyait très vite.
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.