pendrevsprendraTell them apart

Which to use

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

#14,110
“pendre” frequency rank
#4,090
“prendra” frequency rank
18200
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pendre prendra
Definition Attacher une chose, une personne ou un animal en haut par une de ses parties, de manière qu’elle ne touche pas en bas. Troisième personne du singulier du futur du verbe prendre.

Where the eye mixes pendre and prendra

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

6 ch
pendre
7 ch
prendra

Why the eye confuses pendre with prendra

A purely visual mix-up. pendre (\pɑ̃dʁ\) and prendra (\pʁɑ̃.dʁa\) 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 18200, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pendre is recorded at frequency rank #14,110, classified as averb, pronounced \pɑ̃dʁ\. prendra is at rank #4,090, tagged as averb, pronounced \pʁɑ̃.dʁa\.

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 18200, this pair ranks #379,504 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of pendre vs prendra

Shared letters: denpr. Private to "pendre": -. Private to "prendra": a.

"pendre" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCV  ·  "prendra" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pendreepndre · pednre · penddre · pender · pendrre · penndre · penrde · pnedre
  • prendraperndra · pprendra · prednra · prendar · prenddra · prendrra · prenndra · prenrda

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "pendre" for "prendra" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\pɑ̃dʁ\ versus \pʁɑ̃.dʁa\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "pendre" or "prendra"?
"prendra" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,090 in our French list, against #14,110 for "pendre". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "pendre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "prendra" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #379,504 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pendre" and "prendra" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pendre vs perdrez". 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 #379,504 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