Which to use
“quête” and “quinte” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #4,179
- “quête” frequency rank
- #28,314
- “quinte” frequency rank
- 32493
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | quête | quinte |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Action par laquelle on cherche. | Intervalle de cinq notes consécutives, y compris les deux extrêmes. |
Where the eye mixes quête and quinte
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. quête runs 5 letters (CVVCV) against quinte's 6 (CVVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between quête and quinte
A purely visual mix-up. quête (\kɛt\) and quinte (\kɛ̃t\) 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 32493, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
quête is recorded at frequency rank #4,179, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɛt\. quinte is at rank #28,314, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɛ̃t\.
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 32493, this pair ranks #296,898 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of quête vs quinte
Shared letters: eqtu. Private to "quête": ê. Private to "quinte": in.
"quête" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV · "quinte" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- quinte ← qiunte · qquinte · quinet · quinnte · quintte · quitne · qunite · uqinte
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "quête" and "quinte" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "quête" or "quinte" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "quête" and "quinte" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "quête" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "quinte" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #296,898 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "quête" and "quinte" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "quinte vs quite". 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 #296,898 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.