allègrevsaltéréWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“allègre” and “altéré” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#42,147
“allègre” frequency rank
#26,954
“altéré” frequency rank
69101
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature allègre altéré
Definition Plein d’entrain, joyeux. Assoiffé.

Where the eye mixes allègre and altéré

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. allègre runs 7 letters (VCCVCCV) against altéré's 6 (VCCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
allègre
6 ch
altéré

Why the eye confuses allègre with altéré

A purely visual mix-up. allègre (\a.lɛɡʁ\) and altéré (\al.te.ʁe\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 69101, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

allègre is recorded at frequency rank #42,147, classified as anadj, pronounced \a.lɛɡʁ\. altéré is at rank #26,954, tagged as anadj, pronounced \al.te.ʁe\.

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 69101, this pair ranks #56,469 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of allègre vs altéré

Shared letters: alr. Private to "allègre": egè. Private to "altéré": té.

"allègre" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCCV  ·  "altéré" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "allègre" for "altéré" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\a.lɛɡʁ\ versus \al.te.ʁe\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "allègre" or "altéré" show up more?
"altéré" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,954 in our French list, against #42,147 for "allègre". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "allègre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "altéré" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #56,469 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "allègre" and "altéré" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "allègre vs allègue". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #56,469 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