Which to use
“Littré” is a name and “livre” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #48,015
- “Littré” frequency rank
- #449
- “livre” frequency rank
- 48464
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | Littré | livre |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Nom de famille français, rendu célèbre par Émile Littré, lexicographe du dix-neuvième siècle. | Assemblage de feuilles manuscrites ou imprimées destinées à être lues. |
Where the eye mixes Littré and livre
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Littré runs 6 letters (CVCCCV) against livre's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: Littré vs livre
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Littré is \li.tʁe\ while livre is \livʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (name vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48464, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
Littré is recorded at frequency rank #48,015, classified as aname, pronounced \li.tʁe\. livre is at rank #449, tagged as anoun, pronounced \livʁ\.
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 48464, this pair ranks #178,702 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of Littré vs livre
Shared letters: ilr. Private to "Littré": té. Private to "livre": ev.
"Littré" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCV · "livre" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- livre ← ilvre · lirve · liver · livrre · livvre · llivre · lvire
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "Littré" for "livre" ever safe?
Frequency check: "Littré" vs "livre" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "Littré" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "livre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #178,702 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "Littré" and "livre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ligure vs Littré". 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 #178,702 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.