Which to use
“des” is an article and “dos” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #10
- “des” frequency rank
- #961
- “dos” frequency rank
- 971
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | des | dos |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Article indéfini du pluriel. C’est ainsi le pluriel de un ou une. | Partie du corps humain située au-dessus du postérieur, depuis le cou jusqu’aux reins. |
Where the eye mixes des and dos
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: des is \de\ while dos is \do\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - e in “des” becomes o in “dos”, and the parts of speech differ too (article vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 971, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
des is recorded at frequency rank #10, classified as anarticle, pronounced \de\. dos is at rank #961, tagged as anoun, pronounced \do\.
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 971, this pair ranks #438,830 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of des vs dos
Shared letters: ds. Private to "des": e. Private to "dos": o.
"des" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "dos" · 3 letters · shape CVC