fenduevsfondéWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: fendue is a noun, fondé is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“fendue” is a noun and “fondé” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#37,811
“fendue” frequency rank
#3,259
“fondé” frequency rank
41070
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature fendue fondé
Definition Jeune fille, jeune femme. Justifié, qui s’appuie sur des faits.

Where the eye mixes fendue and fondé

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. fendue runs 6 letters (CVCCVV) against fondé's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
fendue
5 ch
fondé

Why the eye confuses fendue with fondé

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: fendue is \fɑ̃.dy\ while fondé is \fɔ̃.de\. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41070, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

fendue is recorded at frequency rank #37,811, classified as anoun, pronounced \fɑ̃.dy\. fondé is at rank #3,259, tagged as anadj, pronounced \fɔ̃.de\.

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 41070, this pair ranks #235,741 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of fendue vs fondé

Shared letters: dfn. Private to "fendue": eu. Private to "fondé": .

"fendue" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "fondé" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • fendueefndue · fednue · fenddue · fendeu · fenndue · fenude · ffendue · fnedue

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "fendue" and "fondé" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "fendue" is a noun and "fondé" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "fendue" vs "fondé" - which ranks higher?
"fondé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,259 in our French list, against #37,811 for "fendue". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "fendue" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fondé" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #235,741 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "fendue" and "fondé" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fendue vs fondues". 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 #235,741 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