Which to use
“indépendant” and “indépendants” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #3,204
- “indépendant” frequency rank
- #4,495
- “indépendants” frequency rank
- 7699
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | indépendant | indépendants |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui ne dépend pas de telle personne ou de telle chose, qui ne lui est pas subordonné. | Masculin pluriel de indépendant. |
Same sound, different letters: indépendant vs indépendants
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 11 letters.
Ear matches; page differs - indépendant and indépendants
This is the hard kind. indépendant and indépendants are pronounced identically (\ɛ̃.de.pɑ̃.dɑ̃\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “indépendant” sits inside “indépendants”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7699, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
indépendant is recorded at frequency rank #3,204, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɛ̃.de.pɑ̃.dɑ̃\. indépendants is at rank #4,495, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ɛ̃.de.pɑ̃.dɑ̃\.
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 7699, this pair ranks #422,407 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of indépendant vs indépendants
Shared letters: adeinpté. Private to "indépendant": -. Private to "indépendants": s.
"indépendant" · 11 letters · shape VCCVCVCCVCC · "indépendants" · 12 letters · shape VCCVCVCCVCCC
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "indépendant" for "indépendants" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "indépendant" or "indépendants" show up more?
What to do next
You've separated the homophone pair "indépendant" / "indépendants". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "indépendant" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "indépendants" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #422,407 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "indépendant" and "indépendants" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "indépendances vs indépendants". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #422,407 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.