dévolue vs dévolues, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#38,775
“dévolue” frequency rank: #46,133
“dévolues” frequency rank: 84908
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	dévolue	dévolues
Definition	Féminin singulier de dévolu.	Féminin pluriel de dévolu.

Same sound, different letters: dévolue vs dévolues

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. dévolue runs 7 letters (CVCVCVV) against dévolues's 8 (CVCVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch

dévolue

8 ch

dévolues

Ear matches; page differs - dévolue and dévolues

This is the hard kind. dévolue and dévolues are pronounced identically (\de.vɔ.ly\) 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 1 extra letter(s) - “dévolue” sits inside “dévolues”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 84908, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dévolue is recorded at frequency rank #38,775, classified as anadj, pronounced \de.vɔ.ly\. dévolues is at rank #46,133, tagged as anadj, pronounced \de.vɔ.ly\.

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 84908, this pair ranks #12,184 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of dévolue vs dévolues

Shared letters: delouvé. Private to "dévolue": -. Private to "dévolues": s.

"dévolue" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVV · "dévolues" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCVVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "dévolue" and "dévolues" be used interchangeably?

No. They are pronounced the same (\de.vɔ.ly\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.

Frequency check: "dévolue" vs "dévolues" - which ranks higher?

"dévolue" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #38,775 in our French list, against #46,133 for "dévolues". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

Full dictionary entry for "dévolue" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "dévolues" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #12,184 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"dévolue" and "dévolues" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dévolues vs dévolus". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #12,184 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.