zouma

\zu.ma\

/\zu.ma\/ noun

The verdict

“zouma” is uncommon French (frequency #78,982 among 240 “Z” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#78,982
frequency rank, French
240
“Z” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Grand marché qui se tient le vendredi à Antananarivo.

Corpus desk

Index FR-zouma · zouma · French

zouma · rank #78,982 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #78,982
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-3 3 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 240
  • PHOTO-FINISH ziva

Nearest frequency peer: ziva (-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.

Rangs de longue queue près de « zouma »

Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court

corpus weight

What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « zouma » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for zouma
PropertyValue
Headwordzouma
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\zu.ma\
Letters5
Frequency rank#78,982
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « zouma » en français

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.zoumatombe dans cette queue de rareté:

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

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Voisins rares de la même bande: « ziva » (#78,981), « Zélie » (#78,983), « zarbi » (#78,980). Parmi 240 lemmes en « Z », « zouma » est au #78,982. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

zouma is uncommon French at frequency #78,982 among 240 “Z” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \zu.ma\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Grand marché qui se tient le vendredi à Antananarivo.".

zouma doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable French rules. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.

Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct French form is zouma, spelled Z-O-U-M-A.

Definition

  1. 1
    Grand marché qui se tient le vendredi à Antananarivo.

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

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

  1. On nous expliqua aussi le zouma, immense marché sous des parasols blancs à plan rectangulaire, où l’on trouvait de tout, dans le bruit, les odeurs... et la crainte des voleurs rôdants.

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 "zouma"?
"zouma" is spelled Z-O-U-M-A. The IPA pronunciation is \zu.ma\.
What does "zouma" mean?
As a noun, "zouma" means: Grand marché qui se tient le vendredi à Antananarivo.
How do you pronounce "zouma"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "zouma" is \zu.ma\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "zouma" come from?
"zouma" 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 "zouma", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

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

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list