Which to use
“devious” and “dubious” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #27,807
- “devious” frequency rank
- #15,150
- “dubious” frequency rank
- 42957
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | devious | dubious |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Cunning or deceiving, not straightforward or honest, not frank. | Arousing doubt; questionable; open to suspicion. |
Where the eye mixes devious and dubious
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: devious vs dubious
A purely visual mix-up. devious (/ˈdiː.vi.əs/) and dubious (/ˈd͡ʒuː.bi.əs/) 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 42957, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
devious is recorded at frequency rank #27,807, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈdiː.vi.əs/. dubious is at rank #15,150, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈd͡ʒuː.bi.əs/.
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 42957, this pair ranks #244,553 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of devious vs dubious
Shared letters: diosu. Private to "devious": ev. Private to "dubious": b.
"devious" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVVC · "dubious" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "devious" for "dubious" ever safe?
Which is more common, "devious" or "dubious"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "devious" and "dubious" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "devious" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "dubious" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #244,553 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "devious" and "dubious" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "devious vs Devos". 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 #244,553 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.