feutrevsfrustreWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#24,591
“feutre” frequency rank
#44,469
“frustre” frequency rank
69060
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature feutre frustre
Definition Étoffe non tissée constituée de poils ou de fibres de laine agglomérées ensemble par soufflage, et mise sous pression avec ébouillantage dans la forme, ou, en fabrication traditionnelle mongole par mouillage et foulage. Variante de fruste.

Where the eye mixes feutre and frustre

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. feutre runs 6 letters (CVVCCV) against frustre's 7 (CCVCCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
feutre
7 ch
frustre

Look-alike desk: feutre vs frustre

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: feutre is \føtʁ\ while frustre is \fʁystʁ\. 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 69060, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

feutre is recorded at frequency rank #24,591, classified as anoun, pronounced \føtʁ\. frustre is at rank #44,469, tagged as anadj, pronounced \fʁystʁ\.

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 69060, this pair ranks #56,634 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of feutre vs frustre

Shared letters: efrtu. Private to "feutre": -. Private to "frustre": s.

"feutre" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV  ·  "frustre" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • feutre ← efutre · feture · feurte · feuter · feutrre · feuttre · ffeutre · fuetre
  • frustre ← ffrustre · frrustre · frsutre · frusrte · frusstre · fruster · frustrre · frusttre

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "feutre" and "frustre" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "feutre" is a noun and "frustre" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "feutre" vs "frustre" - which ranks higher?
"feutre" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #24,591 in our French list, against #44,469 for "frustre". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "feutre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "frustre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #56,634 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "feutre" and "frustre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "frustre vs frustrer". 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 #56,634 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