quitteraitvsquittèrentWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#44,122
“quitterait” frequency rank
#37,993
“quittèrent” frequency rank
82115
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature quitterait quittèrent
Definition Troisième personne du singulier du conditionnel présent de quitter. Troisième personne du pluriel du passé simple de quitter.

Where the eye mixes quitterait and quittèrent

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. quitterait (CVVCCVCVVC) and quittèrent (CVVCCVCVCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

10 ch
quitterait
10 ch
quittèrent

Look-alike desk: quitterait vs quittèrent

A purely visual mix-up. quitterait (\ki.tə.ʁɛ\) and quittèrent (\ki.tɛʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 82115, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

quitterait is recorded at frequency rank #44,122, classified as averb, pronounced \ki.tə.ʁɛ\. quittèrent is at rank #37,993, tagged as averb, pronounced \ki.tɛʁ\.

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 82115, this pair ranks #17,391 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of quitterait vs quittèrent

Shared letters: eiqrtu. Private to "quitterait": a. Private to "quittèrent": nè.

"quitterait" · 10 letters · shape CVVCCVCVVC  ·  "quittèrent" · 10 letters · shape CVVCCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • quitterait ← qiutterait · qquitterait · quiterait · quitetrait · quittearit · quitteraitt · quitterati · quitteriat

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "quitterait" for "quittèrent" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ki.tə.ʁɛ\ versus \ki.tɛʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "quitterait" or "quittèrent" show up more?
"quittèrent" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #37,993 in our French list, against #44,122 for "quitterait". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "quitterait" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "quittèrent" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #17,391 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "quitterait" and "quittèrent" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "quitterai vs quitterait". 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 #17,391 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