doingvsdrangWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“doing” and “drang” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#31,509
“doing” frequency rank
#9,171
“drang” frequency rank
40680
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature doing drang
Definition Partizip Präsens (present participle) des Verbs do 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präteritum Aktiv des Verbs dringen

Where the eye mixes doing and drang

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
doing
5 ch
drang

Why the eye confuses doing with drang

A purely visual mix-up. doing ([ˈduːɪŋ]) and drang ([dʁaŋ]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40680, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

doing is recorded at frequency rank #31,509, classified as averb, pronounced [ˈduːɪŋ]. drang is at rank #9,171, tagged as averb, pronounced [dʁaŋ].

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 40680, this pair ranks #1,501,495 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of doing vs drang

Shared letters: dgn. Private to "doing": io. Private to "drang": ar.

"doing" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "drang" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • doingddoing · diong · doign · doingg · doinng · donig · oding
  • drangdarng · ddrang · dragn · drangg · dranng · drnag · drrang · rdang

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "doing" for "drang" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([ˈduːɪŋ] versus [dʁaŋ]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "doing" vs "drang" - which ranks higher?
"drang" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,171 in our German list, against #31,509 for "doing". 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 "doing" and "drang" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "doing" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "drang" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,501,495 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "doing" and "drang" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "doing vs domini". 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 #1,501,495 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