designs vs désires, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#41,219
“designs” frequency rank: #37,301
“désires” frequency rank: 78520
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	designs	désires
Definition	Pluriel de design.	Deuxième personne du singulier du présent de l’indicatif de désirer.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set designs and désires apart are highlighted. They share 4 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

7 ch

designs

7 ch

désires

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: designs is \di.zajn\ while désires is \de.ziʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 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 78520, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

designs is recorded at frequency rank #41,219, classified as anoun, pronounced \di.zajn\. désires is at rank #37,301, tagged as averb, pronounced \de.ziʁ\.

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 78520, this pair ranks #25,531 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of designs vs désires

Shared letters: deis. Private to "designs": gn. Private to "désires": ré.

"designs" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCC · "désires" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

designs ← ddesigns · deisgns · desgins · desiggns · designns · designss · desigsn · desings

Frequency comparison

designs#41,219

désires#37,301

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "designs" and "désires" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "designs" is a noun and "désires" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "designs" or "désires"?

"désires" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #37,301 in our French list, against #41,219 for "designs". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering designs vs désires

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “designs”; for a verb, it's “désires”.
See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “designs” entry
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