DavaovsDuvalTell them apart

Which to use

“Davao” and “Duval” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#29,990
“Davao” frequency rank
#26,769
“Duval” frequency rank
56759
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Davao Duval
Definition A former province of Mindanao, Philippines. A topographic surname from French of French origin, for someone who lived in a valley.

Letter map: Davao vs Duval

Shared letters muted; letters that set Davao and Duval apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. Davao (CVCVV) and Duval (CVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
Davao
5 ch
Duval

Spelling & dictionary notes on Davao vs Duval

Davao and Duval are indexed as a confusable English pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56759, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Davao is recorded at frequency rank #29,990, classified as aname, pronounced /ˈda.vaʊ̯/. Duval is at rank #26,769, tagged as aname.

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 56759, this pair ranks #123,952 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Davao vs Duval

Shared letters: adv. Private to "Davao": o. Private to "Duval": lu.

"Davao" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "Duval" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Davao ← advao · daavo · davoa · davvao · ddavao · dvaao
  • Duval ← dduval · duavl · duvall · duvla · duvval · dvual · udval

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Davao" and "Duval" be used interchangeably?
No. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Which is more common, "Davao" or "Duval"?
"Duval" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,769 in our English list, against #29,990 for "Davao". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "Davao" and "Duval".

  • Full dictionary entry for "Davao" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Duval" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #123,952 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Davao" and "Duval" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "drupal vs Duval". 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 #123,952 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list