Which to use
“donnais” and “donnait” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #21,598
- “donnais” frequency rank
- #5,238
- “donnait” frequency rank
- 26836
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | donnais | donnait |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Première personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de donner. | Troisième personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de donner. |
Same sound, different letters: donnais vs donnait
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. donnais and donnait follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Same sound, different spelling - donnais / donnait
This is the hard kind. donnais and donnait are pronounced identically (\dɔ.nɛ\) 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 a single letter - s in “donnais” becomes t in “donnait”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26836, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
donnais is recorded at frequency rank #21,598, classified as averb, pronounced \dɔ.nɛ\. donnait is at rank #5,238, tagged as averb, pronounced \dɔ.nɛ\.
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 26836, this pair ranks #332,569 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of donnais vs donnait
Shared letters: adino. Private to "donnais": s. Private to "donnait": t.
"donnais" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC · "donnait" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "donnais" and "donnait" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "donnais" vs "donnait" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
"donnais" and "donnait" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "donnais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "donnait" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #332,569 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "donnais" and "donnait" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "donnais vs Donnie". 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 #332,569 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.