enjouévsentouréWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: enjoué is a adjective, entouré is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“enjoué” is an adjective and “entouré” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#39,281
“enjoué” frequency rank
#4,574
“entouré” frequency rank
43855
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature enjoué entouré
Definition Qui a de l’enjouement. Participe passé masculin du verbe entourer.

Where the eye mixes enjoué and entouré

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. enjoué runs 6 letters (VCCVVV) against entouré's 7 (VCCVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
enjoué
7 ch
entouré

Visual trap between enjoué and entouré

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: enjoué is \ɑ̃.ʒwe\ while entouré is \ɑ̃.tu.ʁe\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43855, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

enjoué is recorded at frequency rank #39,281, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɑ̃.ʒwe\. entouré is at rank #4,574, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɑ̃.tu.ʁe\.

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 43855, this pair ranks #214,864 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of enjoué vs entouré

Shared letters: enoué. Private to "enjoué": j. Private to "entouré": rt.

"enjoué" · 6 letters · shape VCCVVV  ·  "entouré" · 7 letters · shape VCCVVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "enjoué" and "entouré" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "enjoué" is an adjective and "entouré" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "enjoué" vs "entouré" - which ranks higher?
"entouré" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,574 in our French list, against #39,281 for "enjoué". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "enjoué" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "entouré" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #214,864 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "enjoué" and "entouré" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "enjoué vs enjouée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #214,864 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