ignoraisvsignoraitWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#19,312
“ignorais” frequency rank
#14,698
“ignorait” frequency rank
34010
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ignorais ignorait
Definition Première personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de ignorer. Troisième personne du singulier de l’imparfait de l’indicatif de ignorer.

Same sound, different letters: ignorais vs ignorait

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. ignorais and ignorait follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCCVCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

8 ch
ignorais
8 ch
ignorait

Homophone desk: ignorais vs ignorait

This is the hard kind. ignorais and ignorait are pronounced identically (\i.ɲɔ.ʁɛ\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by a single letter - s in “ignorais” becomes t in “ignorait”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 34010, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ignorais is recorded at frequency rank #19,312, classified as averb, pronounced \i.ɲɔ.ʁɛ\. ignorait is at rank #14,698, tagged as averb, pronounced \i.ɲɔ.ʁɛ\.

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 34010, this pair ranks #286,758 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ignorais vs ignorait

Shared letters: aginor. Private to "ignorais": s. Private to "ignorait": t.

"ignorais" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCVVC  ·  "ignorait" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • ignorais ← ginorais · iggnorais · ignnorais · ignoaris · ignoraiss · ignorasi · ignorias · ignorrais
  • ignorait ← ginorait · iggnorait · ignnorait · ignoarit · ignoraitt · ignorati · ignoriat · ignorrait

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ignorais" and "ignorait" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\i.ɲɔ.ʁɛ\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "ignorais" vs "ignorait" - which ranks higher?
"ignorait" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,698 in our French list, against #19,312 for "ignorais". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've separated the homophone pair "ignorais" / "ignorait". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ignorais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ignorait" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #286,758 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ignorais" and "ignorait" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ignorais vs ignorées". 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 #286,758 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