# Deng vs dig

> English confusable word pair

## The two words

### Deng
*name · IPA /dʌŋ/ · frequency rank #22,347*
A common surname from Chinese, sometimes romanised as Teng, notably borne by Chinese politician Deng Xiaoping.

### dig
*verb · IPA /dɪɡ/ · frequency rank #4,940*
To move hard-packed earth out of the way, especially downward to make a hole with a shovel. Or to drill, or the like, through rocks, roads, or the like. More generally, to make any similar hole by moving material out of the way.

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/vs/deng-vs-dig