défilévsdevineWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#6,498
“défilé” frequency rank
#10,485
“devine” frequency rank
16983
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature défilé devine
Definition Passage étroit où il ne peut passer que peu de personnes de front. Variante de devineresse.

Where the eye mixes défilé and devine

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

6 ch
défilé
6 ch
devine

Visual trap between défilé and devine

A purely visual mix-up. défilé (\de.fi.le\) and devine (\də.vin\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 4 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16983, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

défilé is recorded at frequency rank #6,498, classified as anoun, pronounced \de.fi.le\. devine is at rank #10,485, tagged as anoun, pronounced \də.vin\.

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 16983, this pair ranks #385,360 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of défilé vs devine

Shared letters: di. Private to "défilé": flé. Private to "devine": env.

"défilé" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "devine" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • devineddevine · deivne · devien · devinne · devnie · devvine · dveine · edvine

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "défilé" for "devine" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\de.fi.le\ versus \də.vin\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "défilé" vs "devine" - which ranks higher?
"défilé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,498 in our French list, against #10,485 for "devine". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "défilé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "devine" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #385,360 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "défilé" and "devine" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "devine vs devins". 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 #385,360 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