grandvsgraviWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#136
“grand” frequency rank
#36,420
“gravi” frequency rank
36556
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature grand gravi
Definition De dimensions (hauteur/taille, longueur, profondeur, etc.) importantes, qui dépassent celles de ses semblables, ou de longue durée. Par exemple, de volume supérieur à la moyenne (ou normale) des individus de même espèce et sexe et d’âge similaire. Participe passé masculin singulier de gravir.

Where the eye mixes grand and gravi

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
grand
5 ch
gravi

Look-alike desk: grand vs gravi

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: grand is \ɡʁɑ̃\ while gravi is \ɡʁa.vi\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36556, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

grand is recorded at frequency rank #136, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɡʁɑ̃\. gravi is at rank #36,420, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɡʁa.vi\.

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 36556, this pair ranks #268,801 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of grand vs gravi

Shared letters: agr. Private to "grand": dn. Private to "gravi": iv.

"grand" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "gravi" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • grandgarnd · ggrand · gradn · grandd · grannd · grnad · grrand · rgand
  • gravigarvi · ggravi · graiv · gravvi · grravi · grvai · rgavi

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "grand" and "gravi" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "grand" is an adjective and "gravi" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "grand" or "gravi"?
"grand" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #136 in our French list, against #36,420 for "gravi". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "grand" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "gravi" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #268,801 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "grand" and "gravi" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ghazi vs gravi". 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 #268,801 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