surprendre

/\syʁ.pʁɑ̃dʁ\/ verb

Letters

10 characters

Frequency Rank

#7,250

in French word usage

Misspellings

16

tracked variants

Confusables

4

similar word pairs

surprendre is aFrenchverb. It means: Prendre sur le fait, trouver dans une action, dans un état où on ne croyait pas être vu, en parlant de quelqu’un. Pronounced \syʁ.pʁɑ̃dʁ\. It ranks #7,250 in French word frequency. Often confused with suspendre and surprends.

Key facts for surprendre
PropertyValue
Headwordsurprendre
LanguageFrench
Part of speechVerb
IPA\syʁ.pʁɑ̃dʁ\
Letters10
Frequency rank#7,250
Misspellings tracked16
Confusable pairs4
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of surprendre in French word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The French entry for surprendre is 10 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \syʁ.pʁɑ̃dʁ\. Corpus data places it at rank #7,250 in overall French word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 8 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 16 documented wrong-spelling variants for surprendre, with forms such as "sruprendre", "ssurprendre", and "suprrendre". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 4 confusable-pair relationships, "suspendre", "surprends", "surprend", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct French form is surprendre, spelled S-U-R-P-R-E-N-D-R-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Prendre sur le fait, trouver dans une action, dans un état où on ne croyait pas être vu, en parlant de quelqu’un.
  2. 2
    Prendre à l’improviste ou au dépourvu.
  3. 3
    Arriver auprès de quelqu’un sans être attendu.
  4. 4
    Se dit des choses auxquelles on ne s’attendait point, le plus souvent des choses désagréables et qui traversent nos desseins.
  5. 5
    Tromper, abuser, induire en erreur.
  6. 6
    Obtenir frauduleusement, par artifice, par des voies indues.
  7. 7
    Remarquer des actions, des gestes qui échappent à quelqu’un.
  8. 8
    Étonner, frapper l’esprit par quelque chose d’inattendu.

Synonyms

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: sruprendre,ssurprendre,suprrendre,surperndre,surpprendre,surprednre,surprenddre,surprender,surprendrre,surprenndre,surprenrde,surprnedre,surprrendre,surrpendre,surrprendre,usrprendre

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for surprendre

Misspelling Variants of "surprendre"

sruprendre10ssurprendre11suprrendre10surperndre10surpprendre11surprednre10surprenddre11surprender10
Misspelling Variants of "surprendre"

Frequency rank: #7,250 in French

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "surprendre"?
"surprendre" is spelled S-U-R-P-R-E-N-D-R-E. The IPA pronunciation is \syʁ.pʁɑ̃dʁ\.
What does "surprendre" mean?
As a verb, "surprendre" means: Prendre sur le fait, trouver dans une action, dans un état où on ne croyait pas être vu, en parlant de quelqu’un.
What words are commonly confused with "surprendre"?
"surprendre" is commonly confused with "suspendre", "surprends", "surprend". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "surprendre"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "surprendre" is \syʁ.pʁɑ̃dʁ\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "surprendre" come from?
"surprendre" is a French word. PlainSpell covers definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German.
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.

Nearby French words

Other entries that begin with the letter S in our French index:

Explore PlainSpell

Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.