démentievsdémentirTell them apart

Quick tell: démentie is a adjective, démentir is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“démentie” is an adjective and “démentir” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#34,997
“démentie” frequency rank
#27,415
“démentir” frequency rank
62412
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature démentie démentir
Definition Féminin singulier de démenti. Contredire quelqu’un en niant la véracité de ce qu’il a affirmé.

Where the eye mixes démentie and démentir

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. démentie (CVCVCCVV) and démentir (CVCVCCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

8 ch
démentie
8 ch
démentir

Visual trap between démentie and démentir

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: démentie is \de.mɑ̃.ti\ while démentir is \de.mɑ̃.tiʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - e in “démentie” becomes r in “démentir”, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62412, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

démentie is recorded at frequency rank #34,997, classified as anadj, pronounced \de.mɑ̃.ti\. démentir is at rank #27,415, tagged as averb, pronounced \de.mɑ̃.tiʁ\.

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 62412, this pair ranks #87,267 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of démentie vs démentir

Shared letters: deimnté. Private to "démentie": -. Private to "démentir": r.

"démentie" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVV  ·  "démentir" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "démentie" for "démentir" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "démentie" is an adjective and "démentir" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "démentie" or "démentir"?
"démentir" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #27,415 in our French list, against #34,997 for "démentie". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "démentie" and "démentir" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "démentie" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "démentir" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #87,267 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "démentie" and "démentir" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "démentie vs démettre". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #87,267 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