tropvstrueWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: trop is a adverb, true is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“trop” is an adverb and “true” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#125
“trop” frequency rank
#12,495
“true” frequency rank
12620
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature trop true
Definition Plus qu’il ne faut ; avec excès. Vrai , vraie.

Where the eye mixes trop and true

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
trop
4 ch
true

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: trop is \tʁo\ while true is \tɹu\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adverb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12620, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

trop is recorded at frequency rank #125, classified as anadv, pronounced \tʁo\. true is at rank #12,495, tagged as anadj, pronounced \tɹu\.

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 12620, this pair ranks #404,491 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of trop vs true

Shared letters: rt. Private to "trop": op. Private to "true": eu.

"trop" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "true" · 4 letters · shape CCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • troprtop · torp · tropp · trpo · trrop · ttrop
  • truertue · treu · trrue · ttrue

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "trop" and "true" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "trop" is an adverb and "true" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "trop" or "true"?
"trop" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #125 in our French list, against #12,495 for "true". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

You've compared "trop" and "true". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "trop" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "true" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #404,491 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "trop" and "true" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "true vs tun". 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

PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list