telle

\tɛl\

/\tɛl\/ adj

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

The verdict

“telle” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #988) as an adjective. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#988
frequency rank, French
3,703
“T” headwords
4
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Féminin singulier de tel.

Corpus desk

Index FR-telle · telle · French

telle · rank #988 · 4 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-CORE #988
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-LOW 4 variants
  • BOOK-MID 3,703
  • PHOTO-FINISH rendez

Nearest frequency peer: rendez (-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.

Voisins de fréquence du confusable « telle »

Pairs de poids proche dans le corpus, séparés des confusables ci-dessous

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « telle » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

telle vs tête
40% similar
telle vs tels
60% similar
telle vs tôle
60% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for telle
PropertyValue
Headwordtelle
LanguageFrench
Part of speechAdjective
IPA\tɛl\
Letters5
Frequency rank#988
Misspellings tracked4
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « telle »

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.tellese place ici:

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

L'axe est logarithmique: chaque tic marque environ dix fois moins de fréquence. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « rendez » (#987), « territoire » (#989), « quartier » (#986). Parmi 3,703 lemmes en « T », « telle » est au #988. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for telle is neighbouring look-alikes ("tête", "tels", …), not just typos; it is anadjective pronounced \tɛl\. Frequency #988 among 3,703 “T” headwords. Gloss: "Féminin singulier de tel.".

Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for telle, with forms such as "etlle", "telel", and "tlele". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "tête", "tels", "tôle", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

Our source data has no etymology on file 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 telle, spelled T-E-L-L-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Féminin singulier de tel.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. Le ms. d’Oxford, qui a servi de base pour mon édition du texte, offre à première vue une telle diversité de graphies et de formes qu’il semblerait inutile d’essayer de caractériser la langue.
  2. Il eut tort de citer le mot de Voltaire, qui est beaucoup trop décisif et immodéré : « L’écriture est la peinture de la voix ; plus elle est ressemblante, meilleure elle est », et qui conduirait à l’orthographe individuelle, c’est-à-dire à une confusion telle qu’on ne se comprendrait jamais quand on s’écrirait les uns aux autres.

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • etlle
  • telel
  • tlele
  • ttelle

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of telle - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.

etlle2telel2tlele2ttelle1
Edit distance from "telle"

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 "telle"?
"telle" is spelled T-E-L-L-E. The IPA pronunciation is \tɛl\.
What does "telle" mean?
As an adjective, "telle" means: Féminin singulier de tel.
What words are commonly confused with "telle"?
"telle" is commonly confused with "tête", "tels", "tôle". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "telle"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "telle" is \tɛl\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "telle" come from?
"telle" 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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "telle", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

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

vente#991films#980lieux#1,003pieds#1,006

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list