Which to use
“faculté” and “faute” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #3,609
- “faculté” frequency rank
- #874
- “faute” frequency rank
- 4483
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | faculté | faute |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Puissance physique ou morale qui rend un être capable d’agir d’une certaine manière, de produire certains effets. | Manquement plus ou moins grave à un devoir, à une loi, à une règle, à un usage, à une convenance. |
Where the eye mixes faculté and faute
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. faculté runs 7 letters (CVCVCCV) against faute's 5 (CVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses faculté with faute
A purely visual mix-up. faculté (\fa.kyl.te\) and faute (\fot\) 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 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4483, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
faculté is recorded at frequency rank #3,609, classified as anoun, pronounced \fa.kyl.te\. faute is at rank #874, tagged as anoun, pronounced \fot\.
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 4483, this pair ranks #431,495 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of faculté vs faute
Shared letters: aftu. Private to "faculté": clé. Private to "faute": e.
"faculté" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCV · "faute" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- faute ← afute · fatue · fauet · fautte · ffaute · fuate
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "faculté" and "faute" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary French text, does "faculté" or "faute" show up more?
Useful next steps
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "faculté" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "faute" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #431,495 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "faculté" and "faute" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "faculté vs fécule". 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 #431,495 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.