teckvstêtuWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: teck is a noun, têtu is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“teck” is a noun and “têtu” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#45,910
“teck” frequency rank
#23,059
“têtu” frequency rank
68969
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature teck têtu
Definition Grand arbre de la famille des verbénacées, qui croît dans l’Inde, et dont le bois imputrescible est recherché pour la construction des vaisseaux. Opiniâtre, obstiné, qui ne veut pas démordre de son idée, opinion, ou volonté.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set teck and têtu apart are highlighted. They share 1 letter in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

4 ch
teck
4 ch
têtu

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: teck is \tɛk\ while têtu is \tɛ.ty\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68969, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

teck is recorded at frequency rank #45,910, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɛk\. têtu is at rank #23,059, tagged as anadj, pronounced \tɛ.ty\.

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 68969, this pair ranks #57,006 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of teck vs têtu

Shared letters: t. Private to "teck": cek. Private to "têtu": .

"teck" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "têtu" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tecketck · tcek · tecck · teckk · tekc · tteck

Frequency comparison

teck#45,910
têtu#23,059

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "teck" and "têtu" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "teck" is a noun and "têtu" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "teck" or "têtu"?
"têtu" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,059 in our French list, against #45,910 for "teck". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering teck vs têtu

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “teck”; for an adjective, it's “têtu”.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “teck” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list