drinkvsduringWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: drink is a verb, during is a preposition, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“drink” is a verb and “during” is a preposition - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,334
“drink” frequency rank
#181
“during” frequency rank
1515
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature drink during
Definition To consume (a liquid) through the mouth. For all of a given time interval; throughout; in; pending.

Where the eye mixes drink and during

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
drink
6 ch
during

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: drink is /dɹɪŋk/ while during is /ˈdjʊə.ɹɪŋ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs preposition), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1515, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

drink is recorded at frequency rank #1,334, classified as averb, pronounced /dɹɪŋk/. during is at rank #181, tagged as aprep, pronounced /ˈdjʊə.ɹɪŋ/.

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 1515, this pair ranks #527,269 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of drink vs during

Shared letters: dinr. Private to "drink": k. Private to "during": gu.

"drink" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "during" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • drinkddrink · dirnk · drikn · drinkk · drinnk · drnik · drrink · rdink
  • duringdduring · druing · duirng · durign · duringg · durinng · durnig · durring

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "drink" and "during" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "drink" is a verb and "during" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "drink" or "during"?
"during" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #181 in our English list, against #1,334 for "drink". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list