degvsducWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: deg is a verb, duc is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“deg” is a verb and “duc” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#33,522
“deg” frequency rank
#48,075
“duc” frequency rank
81597
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature deg duc
Definition 3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs degt der Herzog, der Führer

Where the eye mixes deg and duc

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence. deg and duc follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

3 ch
deg
3 ch
duc

Visual trap between deg and duc

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: deg is [dɛk] while duc is [duk]. 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 (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 81597, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

deg is recorded at frequency rank #33,522, classified as averb, pronounced [dɛk]. duc is at rank #48,075, tagged as anoun, pronounced [duk].

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 81597, this pair ranks #172,714 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of deg vs duc

Shared letters: d. Private to "deg": eg. Private to "duc": cu.

"deg" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "duc" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "deg" and "duc" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "deg" is a verb and "duc" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "deg" or "duc" show up more?
"deg" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #33,522 in our German list, against #48,075 for "duc". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "deg" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "duc" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #172,714 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "deg" and "duc" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "duc vs dusch". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #172,714 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list