perdevsperdentWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#13,654
“perde” frequency rank
#5,592
“perdent” frequency rank
19246
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perde perdent
Definition Première personne du singulier du présent du subjonctif de perdre. Troisième personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de perdre.

Same sound, different letters: perde vs perdent

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters.

5 ch
perde
7 ch
perdent

Ear matches; page differs - perde and perdent

This is the hard kind. perde and perdent are pronounced identically (\pɛʁd\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “perde” sits inside “perdent”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19246, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perde is recorded at frequency rank #13,654, classified as averb, pronounced \pɛʁd\. perdent is at rank #5,592, tagged as averb, pronounced \pɛʁd\.

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 19246, this pair ranks #374,216 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of perde vs perdent

Shared letters: depr. Private to "perde": -. Private to "perdent": nt.

"perde" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "perdent" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • perdeeprde · pedre · perdde · pered · pperde · prede
  • perdenteprdent · pedrent · perddent · perdennt · perdentt · perdetn · perdnet · perednt

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "perde" and "perdent" be used interchangeably?
No. They are pronounced the same (\pɛʁd\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "perde" vs "perdent" - which ranks higher?
"perdent" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,592 in our French list, against #13,654 for "perde". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "perde" / "perdent". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "perde" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "perdent" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #374,216 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perde" and "perdent" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "perde vs prude". 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 #374,216 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