Which to use
“important” is an adjective and “importent” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #478
- “important” frequency rank
- #23,240
- “importent” frequency rank
- 23718
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | important | importent |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui importe ; qui est majeur, conséquent, considérable ou d’un grand intérêt. | Troisième personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de importer. |
Where the eye mixes important and importent
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 8 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses important with importent
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: important is \ɛ̃.pɔʁ.tɑ̃\ while importent is \ɛ̃.pɔʁt\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - a in “important” becomes e in “importent”, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23718, 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\. importent is at rank #23,240, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɛ̃.pɔʁt\.
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 23718, this pair ranks #350,864 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of important vs importent
Shared letters: imnoprt. Private to "important": a. Private to "importent": e.
"important" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCCVCC · "importent" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "important" and "importent" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary French text, does "important" or "importent" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "important" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "importent" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #350,864 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "important" and "importent" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "importée vs importent". 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 #350,864 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.