donavsdouaiTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#35,903
“dona” frequency rank
#16,113
“douai” frequency rank
52016
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dona douai
Definition Sainte. Première personne du singulier de l’indicatif passé simple du verbe douer.

Letter map: dona vs douai

Shared letters muted; letters that set dona and douai apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. dona runs 4 letters (CVCV) against douai's 5 (CVVVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
dona
5 ch
douai

Grammar separator: dona vs douai

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: dona is anoun and douaiaverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 52016, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dona is recorded at frequency rank #35,903, classified as anoun. douai is at rank #16,113, tagged as averb, pronounced \dwe\.

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 52016, this pair ranks #150,790 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dona vs douai

Shared letters: ado. Private to "dona": n. Private to "douai": iu.

"dona" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "douai" · 5 letters · shape CVVVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dona ← ddona · dnoa · doan · odna
  • douai ← ddouai · doaui · douia · duoai · oduai

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "dona" for "douai" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dona" is a noun and "douai" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "dona" or "douai"?
"douai" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,113 in our French list, against #35,903 for "dona". 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 "dona" and "douai".

  • Full dictionary entry for "dona" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "douai" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #150,790 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dona" and "douai" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "domi vs dona". 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 #150,790 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