perduvsPermWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: perdu is a adjective, Perm is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“perdu” is an adjective and “Perm” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#634
“perdu” frequency rank
#33,397
“Perm” frequency rank
34031
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perdu Perm
Definition Dont on n’a plus la possession, la jouissance. Ville de la Russie européenne, située au pied des monts Oural.

Where the eye mixes perdu and Perm

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
perdu
4 ch
Perm

Look-alike desk: perdu vs Perm

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: perdu is \pɛʁ.dy\ while Perm is \pɛʁm\. 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 (adjective vs name), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 34031, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perdu is recorded at frequency rank #634, classified as anadj, pronounced \pɛʁ.dy\. Perm is at rank #33,397, tagged as aname, pronounced \pɛʁm\.

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 34031, this pair ranks #286,631 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of perdu vs Perm

Shared letters: epr. Private to "perdu": du. Private to "Perm": m.

"perdu" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "Perm" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • perdueprdu · pedru · perddu · perrdu · perud · pperdu · predu
  • Permeprm · pemr · permm · perrm · pperm

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "perdu" for "Perm" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "perdu" is an adjective and "Perm" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "perdu" or "Perm" show up more?
"perdu" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #634 in our French list, against #33,397 for "Perm". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "perdu" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Perm" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #286,631 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perdu" and "Perm" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "peep vs Perm". 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 #286,631 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