Which to use
“important” and “importantes” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #478
- “important” frequency rank
- #1,998
- “importantes” frequency rank
- 2476
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | important | importantes |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui importe ; qui est majeur, conséquent, considérable ou d’un grand intérêt. | Féminin pluriel de important. |
Where the eye mixes important and importantes
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between important and importantes
A purely visual mix-up. important (\ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tɑ̃\) and importantes (\ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tɑ̃t\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “important” sits inside “importantes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2476, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
important is recorded at frequency rank #478, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tɑ̃\. importantes is at rank #1,998, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tɑ̃t\.
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 2476, this pair ranks #436,067 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of important vs importantes
Shared letters: aimnoprt. Private to "important": -. Private to "importantes": es.
"important" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCCVCC · "importantes" · 11 letters · shape VCCVCCVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- important ← immportant · imoprtant · imporatnt · imporrtant · importannt · importantt · importatn · importnat
- importantes ← immportantes · imoprtantes · imporatntes · imporrtantes · importanets · importanntes · importantess · importantse
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "important" and "importantes" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary French text, does "important" or "importantes" show up more?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "important" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "importantes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #436,067 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "important" and "importantes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "importantes vs imposantes". 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 #436,067 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.