affaiblievsaffaiblitTell them apart

Quick tell: affaiblie is a noun, affaiblit is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“affaiblie” is a noun and “affaiblit” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#23,439
“affaiblie” frequency rank
#22,474
“affaiblit” frequency rank
45913
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature affaiblie affaiblit
Definition Personne physiquement ou moralement diminuée ou amoindrie, personne en état de faiblesse intellectuelle. Troisième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de affaiblir.

Same sound, different letters: affaiblie vs affaiblit

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 8 letters. affaiblie (VCCVVCCVV) and affaiblit (VCCVVCCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

9 ch
affaiblie
9 ch
affaiblit

Ear matches; page differs - affaiblie and affaiblit

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: affaiblie and affaiblit carry the same recorded pronunciation, \a.fe.bli\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by a single letter - e in “affaiblie” becomes t in “affaiblit”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45913, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

affaiblie is recorded at frequency rank #23,439, classified as anoun, pronounced \a.fe.bli\. affaiblit is at rank #22,474, tagged as averb, pronounced \a.fe.bli\.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 45913, this pair ranks #199,110 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of affaiblie vs affaiblit

Shared letters: abfil. Private to "affaiblie": e. Private to "affaiblit": t.

"affaiblie" · 9 letters · shape VCCVVCCVV  ·  "affaiblit" · 9 letters · shape VCCVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • affaiblie ← afafiblie · afaiblie · affabilie · affaibblie · affaibile · affaiblei · affaibllie · affailbie
  • affaiblit ← afafiblit · afaiblit · affabilit · affaibblit · affaibilt · affaiblitt · affaibllit · affaiblti

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "affaiblie" and "affaiblit" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "affaiblie" is a noun and "affaiblit" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "affaiblie" or "affaiblit" show up more?
"affaiblit" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22,474 in our French list, against #23,439 for "affaiblie". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "affaiblie" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "affaiblit" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #199,110 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "affaiblie" and "affaiblit" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "affable vs affaiblie". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #199,110 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list