Which to use
“legal” and “létale” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #24,656
- “legal” frequency rank
- #35,585
- “létale” frequency rank
- 60241
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | legal | létale |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Légal, légale : conforme à la loi. | Féminin singulier de létal. |
Where the eye mixes legal and létale
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. legal runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against létale's 6 (CVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses legal with létale
A purely visual mix-up. legal (\leˈɡaːl\) and létale (\le.tal\) 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 60241, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
legal is recorded at frequency rank #24,656, classified as anadj, pronounced \leˈɡaːl\. létale is at rank #35,585, tagged as anadj, pronounced \le.tal\.
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 60241, this pair ranks #98,689 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of legal vs létale
Shared letters: ael. Private to "legal": g. Private to "létale": té.
"legal" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "létale" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- legal ← elgal · leagl · legall · leggal · legla · lgeal · llegal
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "legal" and "létale" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "legal" vs "létale" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "legal" and "létale" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "legal" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "létale" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #98,689 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "legal" and "létale" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "létale vs levage". 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 #98,689 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.