Which to use
“direct” and “directe” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,256
- “direct” frequency rank
- #3,067
- “directe” frequency rank
- 4323
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | direct | directe |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui est droit, qui ne fait aucun détour. | Féminin singulier de direct. |
Same sound, different letters: direct vs directe
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters.
Ear matches; page differs - direct and directe
This is the hard kind. direct and directe are pronounced identically (\di.ʁɛkt\) 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) - “direct” sits inside “directe”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4323, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
direct is recorded at frequency rank #1,256, classified as anadj, pronounced \di.ʁɛkt\. directe is at rank #3,067, tagged as anadj, pronounced \di.ʁɛkt\.
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 4323, this pair ranks #431,889 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of direct vs directe
Shared letters: cdeirt. Private to "direct": -. Private to "directe": -.
"direct" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC · "directe" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "direct" for "directe" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "direct" or "directe" show up more?
What to do next
"direct" and "directe" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "direct" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "directe" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #431,889 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "direct" and "directe" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "digeste vs directe". 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 #431,889 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.