dangervsdonnerWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: danger is a noun, donner is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“danger” is a noun and “donner” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,476
“danger” frequency rank
#327
“donner” frequency rank
1803
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature danger donner
Definition Ce qui est ordinairement suivi d’un malheur, ou qui expose à une perte, à un dommage, etc. Faire un don ; transférer, sans rétribution, la propriété d’une chose que l’on possède ou dont on jouit, à une autre personne.

Where the eye mixes danger and donner

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

6 ch
danger
6 ch
donner

Look-alike desk: danger vs donner

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: danger is \dɑ̃.ʒe\ while donner is \dɔ.ne\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1803, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

danger is recorded at frequency rank #1,476, classified as anoun, pronounced \dɑ̃.ʒe\. donner is at rank #327, tagged as averb, pronounced \dɔ.ne\.

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 1803, this pair ranks #437,368 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of danger vs donner

Shared letters: denr. Private to "danger": ag. Private to "donner": o.

"danger" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "donner" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dangeradnger · dagner · danegr · dangerr · dangger · dangre · dannger · ddanger
  • donnerddonner · dnoner · donenr · doner · donnerr · donnre · odnner

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "danger" and "donner" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "danger" is a noun and "donner" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "danger" or "donner"?
"donner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #327 in our French list, against #1,476 for "danger". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "danger" and "donner" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "danger" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "donner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #437,368 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "danger" and "donner" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "donner vs donniez". 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 #437,368 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list