Which to use
“lente” and “lenteur” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #7,854
- “lente” frequency rank
- #15,426
- “lenteur” frequency rank
- 23280
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | lente | lenteur |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Œuf de pou. | Manque de rapidité dans le mouvement et dans l’action. |
Where the eye mixes lente and lenteur
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. lente runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against lenteur's 7 (CVCCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between lente and lenteur
A purely visual mix-up. lente (\lɑ̃t\) and lenteur (\lɑ̃.tœʁ\) 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) - “lente” sits inside “lenteur”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23280, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
lente is recorded at frequency rank #7,854, classified as anoun, pronounced \lɑ̃t\. lenteur is at rank #15,426, tagged as anoun, pronounced \lɑ̃.tœʁ\.
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 23280, this pair ranks #353,397 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of lente vs lenteur
Shared letters: elnt. Private to "lente": -. Private to "lenteur": ru.
"lente" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "lenteur" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "lente" and "lenteur" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "lente" or "lenteur" show up more?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "lente" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "lenteur" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #353,397 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "lente" and "lenteur" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lente vs leste". 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 #353,397 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.