voudraientvsvoudraisWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#9,576
“voudraient” frequency rank
#2,456
“voudrais” frequency rank
12032
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature voudraient voudrais
Definition Troisième personne du pluriel du conditionnel de vouloir. Première personne du singulier du conditionnel de vouloir.

Same sound, different letters: voudraient vs voudrais

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. voudraient runs 10 letters (CVVCCVVVCC) against voudrais's 8 (CVVCCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

10 ch
voudraient
8 ch
voudrais

Ear matches; page differs - voudraient and voudrais

This is the hard kind. voudraient and voudrais are pronounced identically (\vu.dʁɛ\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12032, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

voudraient is recorded at frequency rank #9,576, classified as averb, pronounced \vu.dʁɛ\. voudrais is at rank #2,456, tagged as averb, pronounced \vu.dʁɛ\.

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 12032, this pair ranks #406,850 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of voudraient vs voudrais

Shared letters: adioruv. Private to "voudraient": ent. Private to "voudrais": s.

"voudraient" · 10 letters · shape CVVCCVVVCC  ·  "voudrais" · 8 letters · shape CVVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • voudraient ← ovudraient · voduraient · voudarient · vouddraient · voudraeint · voudraiennt · voudraientt · voudraietn
  • voudrais ← ovudrais · vodurais · voudaris · vouddrais · voudraiss · voudrasi · voudrias · voudrrais

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "voudraient" and "voudrais" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\vu.dʁɛ\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "voudraient" vs "voudrais" - which ranks higher?
"voudrais" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,456 in our French list, against #9,576 for "voudraient". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "voudraient" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "voudrais" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #406,850 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "voudraient" and "voudrais" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "voteraient vs voudraient". 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 #406,850 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