prendvsprepTell them apart

Quick tell: prend is a verb, prep is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“prend” is a verb and “prep” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#420
“prend” frequency rank
#49,867
“prep” frequency rank
50287
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature prend prep
Definition Troisième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent du verbe prendre. Préposition.

Where the eye mixes prend and prep

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

5 ch
prend
4 ch
prep

Visual trap between prend and prep

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: prend is \pʁɑ̃\ while prep is \ˈprɛp\. 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 (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50287, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

prend is recorded at frequency rank #420, classified as averb, pronounced \pʁɑ̃\. prep is at rank #49,867, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈprɛp\.

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 50287, this pair ranks #163,856 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of prend vs prep

Shared letters: epr. Private to "prend": dn. Private to "prep": -.

"prend" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "prep" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • prendpernd · pprend · predn · prendd · prennd · prned · prrend · rpend
  • prepperp · pprep · prepp · prpe · prrep · rpep

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "prend" and "prep" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "prend" is a verb and "prep" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "prend" or "prep" show up more?
"prend" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #420 in our French list, against #49,867 for "prep". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "prend" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "prep" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #163,856 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "prend" and "prep" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "peep vs prep". 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 #163,856 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