enflévsexiléConfusable pair

Quick tell: enflé is a adjective, exilé is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“enflé” is an adjective and “exilé” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#42,318
“enflé” frequency rank
#17,950
“exilé” frequency rank
60268
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature enflé exilé
Definition Qui est soumis à une enflure. Personne qui quitte volontairement ou non son lieu de vie original.

Where the eye mixes enflé and exilé

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
enflé
5 ch
exilé

Look-alike desk: enflé vs exilé

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: enflé is \ɑ̃.fle\ while exilé is \ɛɡ.zi.le\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60268, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

enflé is recorded at frequency rank #42,318, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɑ̃.fle\. exilé is at rank #17,950, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛɡ.zi.le\.

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 60268, this pair ranks #98,543 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of enflé vs exilé

Shared letters: elé. Private to "enflé": fn. Private to "exilé": ix.

"enflé" · 5 letters · shape VCCCV  ·  "exilé" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "enflé" and "exilé" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "enflé" is an adjective and "exilé" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "enflé" or "exilé" show up more?
"exilé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,950 in our French list, against #42,318 for "enflé". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "enflé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "exilé" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #98,543 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "enflé" and "exilé" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ele vs enflé". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #98,543 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