Which to use
“dance” is a noun and “devance” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #9,465
- “dance” frequency rank
- #16,591
- “devance” frequency rank
- 26056
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | dance | devance |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Ensemble de musiques électroniques entièrement composées pour danser et principalement jouées dans des nightclubs, raves et festivals. | Première personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de devancer. |
Where the eye mixes dance and devance
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between dance and devance
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dance is \dɛns\ while devance is \də.vɑ̃s\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26056, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
dance is recorded at frequency rank #9,465, classified as anoun, pronounced \dɛns\. devance is at rank #16,591, tagged as averb, pronounced \də.vɑ̃s\.
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 26056, this pair ranks #337,377 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of dance vs devance
Shared letters: acden. Private to "dance": -. Private to "devance": v.
"dance" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "devance" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "dance" and "devance" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "dance" or "devance"?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "dance" and "devance" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "dance" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "devance" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #337,377 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "dance" and "devance" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "devance vs déviance". 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 #337,377 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.