ducvsdurchWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#48,075
“duc” frequency rank
#67
“durch” frequency rank
48142
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature duc durch
Definition der Herzog, der Führer in etwas hinein und auf der anderen Seite wieder heraus (wobei oft der Teil dazwischen das Wichtige ist)

Where the eye mixes duc and durch

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

3 ch
duc
5 ch
durch

Why the eye confuses duc with durch

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: duc is [duk] while durch is [dʊʁç]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs preposition), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48142, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

duc is recorded at frequency rank #48,075, classified as anoun, pronounced [duk]. durch is at rank #67, tagged as aprep, pronounced [dʊʁç].

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 48142, this pair ranks #1,259,281 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of duc vs durch

Shared letters: cdu. Private to "duc": -. Private to "durch": hr.

"duc" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "durch" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • durchddurch · druch · ducrh · durcch · durchh · durhc · durrch · udrch

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "duc" and "durch" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "duc" is a noun and "durch" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "duc" vs "durch" - which ranks higher?
"durch" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #67 in our German list, against #48,075 for "duc". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "duc" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "durch" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,259,281 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "duc" and "durch" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "duc vs dusch". 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 #1,259,281 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