deivsdevilWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: dei is a noun, devil is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dei” is a noun and “devil” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,767
“dei” frequency rank
#30,561
“devil” frequency rank
44328
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dei devil
Definition Appel, convocation. Le Diable, Satan.

Letter map: dei vs devil

Shared letters muted; letters that set dei and devil apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

3 ch
dei
5 ch
devil

Grammar separator: dei vs devil

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: dei is anoun and devilaname. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44328, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dei is recorded at frequency rank #13,767, classified as anoun. devil is at rank #30,561, tagged as aname, pronounced \ˈdɛvəl\.

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 44328, this pair ranks #211,243 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dei vs devil

Shared letters: dei. Private to "dei": -. Private to "devil": lv.

"dei" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "devil" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • devilddevil · deivl · devill · devli · devvil · dveil · edvil

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "dei" for "devil" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dei" is a noun and "devil" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "dei" or "devil" show up more?
"dei" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,767 in our French list, against #30,561 for "devil". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "dei" and "devil".

  • Full dictionary entry for "dei" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "devil" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #211,243 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dei" and "devil" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "denim vs devil". 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 #211,243 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