decovsdevosTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#26,324
“deco” frequency rank
#40,210
“devos” frequency rank
66534
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature deco devos
Definition Décence. Futur de devi.

Where the eye mixes deco and devos

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
deco
5 ch
devos

Look-alike desk: deco vs devos

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: deco is \ˈdɛ.ʦɔ\ while devos is \ˈde.vos\. 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 (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66534, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

deco is recorded at frequency rank #26,324, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈdɛ.ʦɔ\. devos is at rank #40,210, tagged as averb, pronounced \ˈde.vos\.

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 66534, this pair ranks #67,397 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of deco vs devos

Shared letters: deo. Private to "deco": c. Private to "devos": sv.

"deco" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "devos" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • decodceo · ddeco · decco · deoc · edco
  • devosddevos · deovs · devoss · devso · devvos · dveos · edvos

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "deco" and "devos" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "deco" is a noun and "devos" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "deco" or "devos" show up more?
"deco" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,324 in our French list, against #40,210 for "devos". 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 "deco" and "devos" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "deco" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "devos" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #67,397 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "deco" and "devos" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "devins 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 #67,397 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