doingvsduringTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#43,532
“doing” frequency rank
#47,754
“during” frequency rank
91286
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature doing during
Definition Participio del verbo do (hacer). Durante

Where the eye mixes doing and during

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

5 ch
doing
6 ch
during

Why the eye confuses doing with during

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: doing is /ˈduː.ɪŋ/ 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 91286, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

doing is recorded at frequency rank #43,532, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈduː.ɪŋ/. during is at rank #47,754, 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 91286, this pair ranks #2,071 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of doing vs during

Shared letters: dgin. Private to "doing": o. Private to "during": ru.

"doing" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "during" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • doingddoing · diong · doign · doingg · doinng · donig · oding
  • duringdduring · druing · duirng · durign · duringg · durinng · durnig · durring

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "doing" for "during" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "doing" is a verb and "during" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "doing" or "during" show up more?
"doing" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #43,532 in our Spanish list, against #47,754 for "during". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "doing" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "during" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,071 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "doing" and "during" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "doing vs dont". 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 #2,071 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list