excluvsexclutConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#6,393
“exclu” frequency rank
#10,153
“exclut” frequency rank
16546
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature exclu exclut
Definition À qui l’on interdit. Troisième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de exclure.

Same sound, different letters: exclu vs exclut

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. exclu runs 5 letters (VCCCV) against exclut's 6 (VCCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
exclu
6 ch
exclut

Same sound, different spelling - exclu / exclut

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: exclu and exclut carry the same recorded pronunciation, \ɛks.kly\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “exclu” sits inside “exclut”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16546, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

exclu is recorded at frequency rank #6,393, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɛks.kly\. exclut is at rank #10,153, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɛks.kly\.

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 16546, this pair ranks #387,340 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of exclu vs exclut

Shared letters: celux. Private to "exclu": -. Private to "exclut": t.

"exclu" · 5 letters · shape VCCCV  ·  "exclut" · 6 letters · shape VCCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • exclu ← ecxlu · excclu · excllu · excul · exlcu · exxclu · xeclu
  • exclut ← ecxlut · excclut · excllut · excltu · exclutt · excult · exlcut · exxclut

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "exclu" for "exclut" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "exclu" is an adjective and "exclut" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "exclu" or "exclut" show up more?
"exclu" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,393 in our French list, against #10,153 for "exclut". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've separated the homophone pair "exclu" / "exclut". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "exclu" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "exclut" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #387,340 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "exclu" and "exclut" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "excluait vs exclut". 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 #387,340 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