permanencevspermanenteConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#4,597
“permanence” frequency rank
#4,360
“permanente” frequency rank
8957
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature permanence permanente
Definition Durée constante de quelque chose, état de ce qui est permanent. Ondulation permanente, c’est-à-dire un traitement appliqué aux cheveux afin de les faire boucler ou friser de façon plus ou moins permanente.

Where the eye mixes permanence and permanente

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence. permanence and permanente follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

10 ch
permanence
10 ch
permanente

Look-alike desk: permanence vs permanente

A purely visual mix-up. permanence (\pɛʁ.ma.nɑ̃s\) and permanente (\pɛʁ.ma.nɑ̃t\) 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 a single letter - c in “permanence” becomes t in “permanente”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8957, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

permanence is recorded at frequency rank #4,597, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɛʁ.ma.nɑ̃s\. permanente is at rank #4,360, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɛʁ.ma.nɑ̃t\.

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 8957, this pair ranks #418,281 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of permanence vs permanente

Shared letters: aemnpr. Private to "permanence": c. Private to "permanente": t.

"permanence" · 10 letters · shape CVCCVCVCCV  ·  "permanente" · 10 letters · shape CVCCVCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • permanence ← eprmanence · pemranence · peramnence · permaennce · permanecne · permanencce · permanenec · permanennce
  • permanente ← eprmanente · pemranente · peramnente · permaennte · permanenet · permanennte · permanentte · permanetne

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "permanence" and "permanente" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\pɛʁ.ma.nɑ̃s\ versus \pɛʁ.ma.nɑ̃t\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "permanence" or "permanente"?
"permanente" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,360 in our French list, against #4,597 for "permanence". 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 "permanence" and "permanente" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "permanence" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "permanente" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #418,281 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "permanence" and "permanente" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "permanence vs permanences". 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 #418,281 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