tenduevsteneurWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#10,957
“tendue” frequency rank
#9,084
“teneur” frequency rank
20041
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tendue teneur
Definition Action de tendre un filet, un piège. Ce qui est contenu mot à mot dans un écrit, son texte littéral.

Where the eye mixes tendue and teneur

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
tendue
6 ch
teneur

Visual trap between tendue and teneur

A purely visual mix-up. tendue (\tɑ̃.dy\) and teneur (\tə.nœʁ\) 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 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 20041, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tendue is recorded at frequency rank #10,957, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɑ̃.dy\. teneur is at rank #9,084, tagged as anoun, pronounced \tə.nœʁ\.

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 20041, this pair ranks #370,217 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tendue vs teneur

Shared letters: entu. Private to "tendue": d. Private to "teneur": r.

"tendue" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "teneur" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tendueetndue · tednue · tenddue · tendeu · tenndue · tenude · tnedue · ttendue
  • teneuretneur · teenur · teneru · teneurr · tenneur · tenuer · tneeur · tteneur

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "tendue" for "teneur" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\tɑ̃.dy\ versus \tə.nœʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "tendue" or "teneur"?
"teneur" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,084 in our French list, against #10,957 for "tendue". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "tendue" and "teneur" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "tendue" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "teneur" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #370,217 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tendue" and "teneur" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tender vs tendue". 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 #370,217 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