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En octobre 1943, l'homme qui avait promis de revenir n'est pas revenu. La ville était pleine de soldats et les gens ne sortaient plus de chez eux. Il y avait un silence étrange, comme si tout le monde attendait quelque chose qui n'arriverait jamais.
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Roughly how many French words do you know?
Choose an approximate vocabulary size to highlight words you may not know yet. This is a frequency-based estimate, not a test of each word you know. Your choice is not saved, and you can change it any time.
Words ranked by frequency
Rarest first, with each word’s rank on the French frequency list. Choose a vocabulary size above to see words you may not know yet.
- sortaientwere going out11,977
- arriveraitwould arrive/happen4,275
- octobreOctober4,013
- attendaitwas waiting2,534
- soldatssoldiers1,424
- revenuincome1,125
- pleinefull1,007
- silencesilence999
- étrangestrange970
- promispromised705
Apera does this for every page of a book or episode: photograph or paste it, practise the words you’re missing, then read or watch the original. How it works
Clues from English
Some words resemble English, some look familiar but mean something different, and others offer fewer clues.
Similar words, different meanings
They look like an English word and mean something else.
Words you may recognise from English
These resemble English words with related meanings. Check the meanings below to see whether your guess fits the passage.
arriverait would arrive/happen·silence silence·étrange strange·promis promised
Rare words with fewer English clues
These uncommon words may be harder to guess from English alone.
- attendait was waiting
What the French sample shows
In the sample, revenir (“to return”) and revenu (“returned”) belong to the same verb but are ranked as separate written forms. The phrase ne sortaient plus means “no longer went out”: knowing the individual words is only part of understanding the sentence.
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The estimate uses the frequency of French word forms to find the vocabulary size needed to cover nine in ten words matched to our list. Words outside the list are reported separately and excluded from that estimate.
This is a vocabulary check, not a grammar checker or a CEFR assessment. It does not measure sentence complexity or guarantee that you will understand the passage.
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