éditervséviterTell them apart

Which to use

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

#18,626
“éditer” frequency rank
#862
“éviter” frequency rank
19488
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature éditer éviter
Definition Publier un ouvrage ou le mettre en vente ; s’emploie généralement au sujet d’un livre. Échapper, se soustraire à quelque chose de nuisible, de désagréable.

Where the eye mixes éditer and éviter

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

6 ch
éditer
6 ch
éviter

Why the eye confuses éditer with éviter

A purely visual mix-up. éditer (\e.di.te\) and éviter (\e.vi.te\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by a single letter - d in “éditer” becomes v in “éviter”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19488, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

éditer is recorded at frequency rank #18,626, classified as averb, pronounced \e.di.te\. éviter is at rank #862, tagged as averb, pronounced \e.vi.te\.

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 19488, this pair ranks #373,024 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of éditer vs éviter

Shared letters: eirté. Private to "éditer": d. Private to "éviter": v.

"éditer" · 6 letters · shape VCVCVC  ·  "éviter" · 6 letters · shape VCVCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "éditer" for "éviter" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\e.di.te\ versus \e.vi.te\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "éditer" or "éviter" show up more?
"éviter" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #862 in our French list, against #18,626 for "éditer". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "éditer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "éviter" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #373,024 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "éditer" and "éviter" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "éditer vs edito". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #373,024 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