Which to use
“cruel” is an adjective and “cruelle” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #8,524
- “cruel” frequency rank
- #14,240
- “cruelle” frequency rank
- 22764
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | cruel | cruelle |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui inflige la souffrance ou la mort ; qui a un caractère de cruauté, en parlant des hommes, des animaux ou des choses. | Femme qui repousse les avances de son soupirant. |
Same sound, different letters: cruel vs cruelle
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. cruel runs 5 letters (CCVVC) against cruelle's 7 (CCVVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Ear matches; page differs - cruel and cruelle
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: cruel and cruelle carry the same recorded pronunciation, \kʁy.ɛl\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other anoun, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “cruel” sits inside “cruelle”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22764, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
cruel is recorded at frequency rank #8,524, classified as anadj, pronounced \kʁy.ɛl\. cruelle is at rank #14,240, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kʁy.ɛl\.
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 22764, this pair ranks #356,272 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of cruel vs cruelle
Shared letters: celru. Private to "cruel": -. Private to "cruelle": -.
"cruel" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "cruelle" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "cruel" and "cruelle" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "cruel" or "cruelle" show up more?
After this comparison
"cruel" and "cruelle" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "cruel" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cruelle" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #356,272 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "cruel" and "cruelle" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cruelle vs cueille". 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 #356,272 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.