entenditvsentenduWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: entendit is a verb, entendu is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#25,644
“entendit” frequency rank
#820
“entendu” frequency rank
26464
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature entendit entendu
Definition Troisième personne du singulier du passé simple de entendre. Qui s’entend bien à une chose.

Where the eye mixes entendit and entendu

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. entendit runs 8 letters (VCCVCCVC) against entendu's 7 (VCCVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
entendit
7 ch
entendu

Visual trap between entendit and entendu

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: entendit is \ɑ̃.tɑ̃.di\ while entendu is \ɑ̃.tɑ̃.dy\. 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 (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26464, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

entendit is recorded at frequency rank #25,644, classified as averb, pronounced \ɑ̃.tɑ̃.di\. entendu is at rank #820, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ɑ̃.tɑ̃.dy\.

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 26464, this pair ranks #334,833 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of entendit vs entendu

Shared letters: dent. Private to "entendit": i. Private to "entendu": u.

"entendit" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCCVC  ·  "entendu" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • entenditenetndit · enntendit · entednit · entenddit · entenditt · entendti · entenidt · entenndit
  • entenduenetndu · enntendu · entednu · entenddu · entenndu · entenud · entnedu · enttendu

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "entendit" and "entendu" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "entendit" is a verb and "entendu" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "entendit" or "entendu"?
"entendu" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #820 in our French list, against #25,644 for "entendit". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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 "entendit" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "entendu" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #334,833 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "entendit" and "entendu" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "entendis vs entendit". 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 #334,833 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