tournavsturnConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#20,304
“tourna” frequency rank
#20,594
“turn” frequency rank
40898
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tourna turn
Definition Troisième personne du singulier du passé simple de tourner. Deuxième personne du singulier de l’impératif présent de turnen.

Where the eye mixes tourna and turn

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

6 ch
tourna
4 ch
turn

Why the eye confuses tourna with turn

A purely visual mix-up. tourna (\tuʁ.na\) and turn (\tʊʁn\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40898, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tourna is recorded at frequency rank #20,304, classified as averb, pronounced \tuʁ.na\. turn is at rank #20,594, tagged as averb, pronounced \tʊʁn\.

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 40898, this pair ranks #237,075 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of tourna vs turn

Shared letters: nrtu. Private to "tourna": ao. Private to "turn": -.

"tourna" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV  ·  "turn" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tournaoturna · toruna · tounra · touran · tournna · tourrna · ttourna · tuorna
  • turntrun · tturn · tunr · turnn · turrn · utrn

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "tourna" and "turn" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\tuʁ.na\ versus \tʊʁn\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "tourna" vs "turn" - which ranks higher?
"tourna" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,304 in our French list, against #20,594 for "turn". 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 "tourna" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "turn" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #237,075 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tourna" and "turn" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "turf vs turn". 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 #237,075 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