vacation
\va.ka.sjɔ̃\
The verdict
“vacation” is a moderately-common French word, ranked #43,713 in French word frequency and used as a noun.
- #43,713
- frequency rank, French
- 8
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 4
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Durée de travail quotidien consacrée par règlement de justice ou d’administration publique à une affaire.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | vacation |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \va.ka.sjɔ̃\ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #43,713 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 4 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “vacation” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for vacation is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \va.ka.sjɔ̃\. Corpus data places it at rank #43,713 in overall French word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for vacation, with forms such as "avcation", "vaaction", and "vacaiton". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 4 confusable-pair relationships, "vocation", "votation", "variation", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct French form is vacation, spelled V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N.
Definition
- 1Durée de travail quotidien consacrée par règlement de justice ou d’administration publique à une affaire.
- 2Se dit de même des salaires, des honoraires qu’on paie aux gens d’affaires, aux gens de loi, aux membres d’un jury d’examen, etc.
- 3Cessation des séances des gens de justice.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: avcation,vaaction,vacaiton,vacatino,vacationn,vacatoin,vacattion,vaccation,vactaion,vcaation,vvacation
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of vacation - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 "vacation"?
What does "vacation" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "vacation"?
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Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “vacation”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \va.ka.sjɔ̃\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “vocation” - see the side-by-side comparison. vacation vs vocation
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
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.