tâtonner
French, verb/ta.tɔ.ne/
tâtonner is spelled T-Â-T-O-N-N-E-R (8 letters) and appears about once in every 9 million words in written French, the 96,749th most frequent French word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Tâtonner is a French verb meaning “to feel one's way, grope around, fumble” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) defines it as “Tâter de manière répétée et dans différentes directions avec la main, avec une autre partie du corps, ou plus…”.
What does tâtonner mean in English?
verb
- 1
to feel one's way, grope around, fumble
Source: English Wiktionary, French section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How French dictionaries define it
verb: 1. Tâter de manière répétée et dans différentes directions avec la main, avec une autre partie du corps, ou plus rarement avec un objet, pour se diriger. 2. Tâter dans l’obscurité, pour se diriger, pour trouver quelque chose. 3. Faire différents essais dans une direction approximative pour arriver à un résultat.
The definition in the French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), in French.
Source: French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of tâtonner
- avoir + past participle infinitive multiword-construction
- tâtonnant gerund participle present
- ayant + past participle gerund multiword-construction participle
- tâtonné participle past
- tâtonne first-person indicative present
- tâtonnes indicative present second-person
- tâtonnons first-person indicative plural
- tâtonnez indicative plural present
- tâtonnent indicative plural present
- tâtonnais first-person imperfect indicative
- tâtonnait imperfect indicative singular
- tâtonnions first-person imperfect indicative
- tâtonniez imperfect indicative plural
- tâtonnaient imperfect indicative plural
- tâtonnai first-person historic indicative
- tâtonnas historic indicative past
- tâtonna historic indicative past
- tâtonnâmes first-person historic indicative
Source: English Wiktionary and French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
How do you pronounce tâtonner?
- /ta.tɔ.ne/
- /tɑ.tɔ.ne/
- \tɑ.tɔ.ne\
Sources: English Wiktionary, French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026); recordings from Wikimedia Commons.
English words that translate to tâtonner
Source: the translation tables of the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026.
How common is tâtonner in French?
tâtonner appears about once in every 9 million words in written French.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).