demeuraientvsdemeuraitWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#42,275
“demeuraient” frequency rank
#23,827
“demeurait” frequency rank
66102
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature demeuraient demeurait
Definition Troisième personne du pluriel de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de demeurer. Troisième personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de demeurer.

Same sound, different letters: demeuraient vs demeurait

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 9 letters. demeuraient runs 11 letters (CVCVVCVVVCC) against demeurait's 9 (CVCVVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

11 ch
demeuraient
9 ch
demeurait

Same sound, different spelling - demeuraient / demeurait

This is the hard kind. demeuraient and demeurait are pronounced identically (\də.mœ.ʁɛ\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66102, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

demeuraient is recorded at frequency rank #42,275, classified as averb, pronounced \də.mœ.ʁɛ\. demeurait is at rank #23,827, tagged as averb, pronounced \də.mœ.ʁɛ\.

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 66102, this pair ranks #69,285 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of demeuraient vs demeurait

Shared letters: adeimrtu. Private to "demeuraient": n. Private to "demeurait": -.

"demeuraient" · 11 letters · shape CVCVVCVVVCC  ·  "demeurait" · 9 letters · shape CVCVVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • demeuraient ← ddemeuraient · deemuraient · demeruaient · demeuarient · demeuraeint · demeuraiennt · demeuraientt · demeuraietn
  • demeurait ← ddemeurait · deemurait · demeruait · demeuarit · demeuraitt · demeurati · demeuriat · demeurrait

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "demeuraient" and "demeurait" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\də.mœ.ʁɛ\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "demeuraient" vs "demeurait" - which ranks higher?
"demeurait" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,827 in our French list, against #42,275 for "demeuraient". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've separated the homophone pair "demeuraient" / "demeurait". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "demeuraient" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "demeurait" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #69,285 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "demeuraient" and "demeurait" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "demeuraient vs demeurant". 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 #69,285 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