faiblirvsfaillitTell them apart

Which to use

“faiblir” and “faillit” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#43,427
“faiblir” frequency rank
#19,834
“faillit” frequency rank
63261
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature faiblir faillit
Definition Devenir faible. Troisième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de faillir.

Where the eye mixes faiblir and faillit

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. faiblir and faillit follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
faiblir
7 ch
faillit

Look-alike desk: faiblir vs faillit

A purely visual mix-up. faiblir (\fe.bliʁ\) and faillit (\fa.ji\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63261, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

faiblir is recorded at frequency rank #43,427, classified as averb, pronounced \fe.bliʁ\. faillit is at rank #19,834, tagged as averb, pronounced \fa.ji\.

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 63261, this pair ranks #82,883 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of faiblir vs faillit

Shared letters: afil. Private to "faiblir": br. Private to "faillit": t.

"faiblir" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC  ·  "faillit" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • faiblir ← afiblir · fabilir · faibblir · faibilr · faiblirr · faibllir · faiblri · failbir
  • faillit ← afillit · faililt · failit · faillitt · faillti · falilit · ffaillit · fiallit

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "faiblir" for "faillit" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\fe.bliʁ\ versus \fa.ji\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "faiblir" vs "faillit" - which ranks higher?
"faillit" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,834 in our French list, against #43,427 for "faiblir". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "faiblir" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "faillit" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #82,883 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "faiblir" and "faillit" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "faiblir vs faiblit". 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 #82,883 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