importevsimputeTell them apart

Which to use

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

#462
“importe” frequency rank
#43,494
“impute” frequency rank
43956
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature importe impute
Definition Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de importer. Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de imputer.

Where the eye mixes importe and impute

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
importe
6 ch
impute

Look-alike desk: importe vs impute

A purely visual mix-up. importe (\ɛ̃.pɔʁt\) and impute (\ɛ̃.pyt\) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43956, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

importe is recorded at frequency rank #462, classified as averb, pronounced \ɛ̃.pɔʁt\. impute is at rank #43,494, tagged as averb, pronounced \ɛ̃.pyt\.

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 43956, this pair ranks #214,107 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of importe vs impute

Shared letters: eimpt. Private to "importe": or. Private to "impute": u.

"importe" · 7 letters · shape VCCVCCV  ·  "impute" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • importeimmporte · imoprte · imporet · imporrte · importte · impotre · impporte · improte
  • imputeimmpute · imppute · imptue · impuet · imputte · imupte · ipmute · mipute

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "importe" for "impute" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ɛ̃.pɔʁt\ versus \ɛ̃.pyt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "importe" or "impute"?
"importe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #462 in our French list, against #43,494 for "impute". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "importe" and "impute" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "importe" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "impute" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #214,107 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "importe" and "impute" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "impulse vs impute". 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 #214,107 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