useless
\ˈju:sləs\
The verdict
“useless” is uncommon French (frequency #64,857 among 44,794 “U” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #64,857
- frequency rank, French
- 44,794
- “U” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Inutile.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | useless |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | \ˈju:sləs\ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #64,857 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “useless” sits in French frequency
Rare enough to double-check
useless is uncommon French at frequency #64,857 among 44,794 “U” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed \ˈju:sləs\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Inutile.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for useless, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable French rules. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct French form is useless, spelled U-S-E-L-E-S-S.
Definition
- 1Inutile.
Synonyms
Antonyms
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
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Using “useless”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is U-S-E-L-E-S-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \ˈju:sləs\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Other uncommon French words near this rank
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.