tempesvstrompésWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#46,482
“tempes” frequency rank
#18,355
“trompés” frequency rank
64837
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tempes trompés
Definition Pluriel de tempe. Masculin pluriel de trompé.

Where the eye mixes tempes and trompés

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. tempes runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against trompés's 7 (CCVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
tempes
7 ch
trompés

Visual trap between tempes and trompés

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: tempes is \tɑ̃p\ while trompés is \tʁɔ̃.pe\. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 64837, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tempes is recorded at frequency rank #46,482, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɑ̃p\. trompés is at rank #18,355, tagged as anadj, pronounced \tʁɔ̃.pe\.

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 64837, this pair ranks #75,118 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of tempes vs trompés

Shared letters: mpst. Private to "tempes": e. Private to "trompés": oré.

"tempes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "trompés" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tempes ← etmpes · temeps · temmpes · tempess · temppes · tempse · tepmes · tmepes

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "tempes" and "trompés" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tempes" is a noun and "trompés" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "tempes" or "trompés" show up more?
"trompés" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,355 in our French list, against #46,482 for "tempes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "tempes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "trompés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #75,118 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tempes" and "trompés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tempes vs trempés". 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 #75,118 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