Which to use
“recevaient” and “recevais” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #25,468
- “recevaient” frequency rank
- #36,559
- “recevais” frequency rank
- 62027
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | recevaient | recevais |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Troisième personne du pluriel de l’imparfait de recevoir. | Première personne du singulier de l’imparfait de recevoir. |
Same sound, different letters: recevaient vs recevais
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters.
Same sound, different spelling - recevaient / recevais
This is the hard kind. recevaient and recevais are pronounced identically (\ʁə.sə.vɛ\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62027, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
recevaient is recorded at frequency rank #25,468, classified as averb, pronounced \ʁə.sə.vɛ\. recevais is at rank #36,559, tagged as averb, pronounced \ʁə.sə.vɛ\.
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 62027, this pair ranks #89,227 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of recevaient vs recevais
Shared letters: aceirv. Private to "recevaient": nt. Private to "recevais": s.
"recevaient" · 10 letters · shape CVCVCVVVCC · "recevais" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- recevaient ← ercevaient · rceevaient · reccevaient · receavient · recevaeint · recevaiennt · recevaientt · recevaietn
- recevais ← ercevais · rceevais · reccevais · receavis · recevaiss · recevasi · recevias · recevvais
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "recevaient" and "recevais" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "recevaient" or "recevais"?
Useful next steps
You've separated the homophone pair "recevaient" / "recevais". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "recevaient" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "recevais" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #89,227 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "recevaient" and "recevais" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "recevais vs recevras". 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 #89,227 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.