vau

\vo\

/\vo\/ noun

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

The verdict

“vau” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #42,109) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#42,109
frequency rank, French
2,061
“V” headwords
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Partie du cintre utilisée pour soutenir la voute pendant sa construction.

Corpus desk

Index FR-vau · vau · French

vau · rank #42,109 · 0 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-MID #42,109
  • LEN-MID 3 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 2,061
  • PHOTO-FINISH Vaugirard

Nearest frequency peer: Vaugirard (+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 « vau »

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

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « vau » 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).

vau vs vu
67% similar
vau vs vi
33% similar
vau vs vs
33% similar

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

Key facts for vau
PropertyValue
Headwordvau
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\vo\
Letters3
Frequency rank#42,109
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « vau »

La fréquence va de la poignée de mots du quotidien (gauche) à la longue queue presque jamais vue (droite).vause place ici:

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

Les tics avancent en logarithme; chacun est de l'ordre de dix fois plus rare. Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « Vaugirard » (#42,110), « utilement » (#42,107), « vectoriel » (#42,111). Parmi 2,061 lemmes en « V », « vau » est au #42,109. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for vau is neighbouring look-alikes ("vu", "vi", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced \vo\. Frequency #42,109 among 2,061 “V” headwords. Gloss: "Partie du cintre utilisée pour soutenir la voute pendant sa construction.".

Zero misspellings are on record for vau in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "vu", "vi", "vs", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.

This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is vau, spelled V-A-U.

Definition

  1. 1
    Partie du cintre utilisée pour soutenir la voute pendant sa construction.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

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

  1. A partir de l’about du dernier vau pour les ponts Antoinette, Annibal et du Diable, c'est-à-dire pour le premier à l'étiage, pour les deux autres à 1m,50 au-dessus.
  2. Si l'on énumère les parties principales d'une de ces fermes, on trouve quatre grands arbalétriers, chacun d'environ 10 mètres en longueur, deux cours de doubles moises de 14 mètres et de 18 mètres, un poinçon et deux contrefiches, sans mentionner les petits arbalétriers qui forment le contour polygonal auquel sont cloués les vaux taillés en courbe.

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 "vau"?
"vau" is spelled V-A-U. The IPA pronunciation is \vo\.
What does "vau" mean?
As a noun, "vau" means: Partie du cintre utilisée pour soutenir la voute pendant sa construction.
What words are commonly confused with "vau"?
"vau" is commonly confused with "vu", "vi", "vs". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "vau"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "vau" is \vo\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "vau" come from?
"vau" 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 "vau", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

UMR#42,102ubi#42,101wie#42,122aes#42,143

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list