Which to use
“cruel” and “cruelles” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #8,524
- “cruel” frequency rank
- #34,486
- “cruelles” frequency rank
- 43010
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | cruel | cruelles |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui inflige la souffrance ou la mort ; qui a un caractère de cruauté, en parlant des hommes, des animaux ou des choses. | Féminin pluriel de cruel. |
Same sound, different letters: cruel vs cruelles
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. cruel runs 5 letters (CCVVC) against cruelles's 8 (CCVVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Ear matches; page differs - cruel and cruelles
This is the hard kind. cruel and cruelles are pronounced identically (\kʁy.ɛl\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 3 extra letter(s) - “cruel” sits inside “cruelles”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43010, 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\. cruelles is at rank #34,486, tagged as anadj, 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 43010, this pair ranks #221,281 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of cruel vs cruelles
Shared letters: celru. Private to "cruel": -. Private to "cruelles": s.
"cruel" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "cruelles" · 8 letters · shape CCVVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "cruel" and "cruelles" be used interchangeably?
Frequency check: "cruel" vs "cruelles" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
You've separated the homophone pair "cruel" / "cruelles". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "cruel" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cruelles" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #221,281 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "cruel" and "cruelles" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Chelles vs cruelles". 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 #221,281 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.