tardy

adj

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“tardy” is uncommon French (frequency #55,638 among 3,703 “T” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#55,638
frequency rank, French
3,703
“T” headwords

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

Corpus desk

Index FR-tardy · tardy · French

tardy · rank #55,638 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #55,638
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 3,703
  • PHOTO-FINISH tartan

Nearest frequency peer: tartan (+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 « tardy »

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

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for tardy
PropertyValue
Headwordtardy
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdjective
Letters5
Frequency rank#55,638
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « tardy » en français

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

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

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Voisins rares de la même bande: « tartan » (#55,639), « tapée » (#55,636), « tartiflette » (#55,640). Parmi 3,703 lemmes en « T », « tardy » est au #55,638. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

tardy is uncommon French at frequency #55,638 among 3,703 “T” headwords, classed as anadjective. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Tardif.".

tardy has no tracked misspelling variants, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is tardy, spelled T-A-R-D-Y.

Definition

  1. 1
    Tardif.

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

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

  1. You were tardy for school ten times this year.

Synonyms

late

Antonyms

early

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 "tardy"?
"tardy" is spelled T-A-R-D-Y.
What does "tardy" mean?
As an adjective, "tardy" means: Tardif.
What language does "tardy" come from?
"tardy" is a French word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
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 "tardy", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

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

tapée#55,636toise#55,648Ségou#55,627tuner#55,662

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list