devantvsdurantWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“devant” and “durant” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#265
“devant” frequency rank
#670
“durant” frequency rank
935
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature devant durant
Definition À l’opposé de, vis-à-vis de, en face de. Tout au long de.

Where the eye mixes devant and durant

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

6 ch
devant
6 ch
durant

Visual trap between devant and durant

A purely visual mix-up. devant (\də.vɑ̃\) and durant (\dy.ʁɑ̃\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 935, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

devant is recorded at frequency rank #265, classified as aprep, pronounced \də.vɑ̃\. durant is at rank #670, tagged as aprep, pronounced \dy.ʁɑ̃\.

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 935, this pair ranks #438,890 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of devant vs durant

Shared letters: adnt. Private to "devant": ev. Private to "durant": ru.

"devant" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC  ·  "durant" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • devantddevant · deavnt · devannt · devantt · devatn · devnat · devvant · dveant
  • durantddurant · druant · duarnt · durannt · durantt · duratn · durnat · durrant

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "devant" and "durant" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\də.vɑ̃\ versus \dy.ʁɑ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "devant" or "durant"?
"devant" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #265 in our French list, against #670 for "durant". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "devant" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "durant" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #438,890 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "devant" and "durant" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "doutant vs durant". 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 #438,890 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