dota vs duty, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#44,989
“dota” frequency rank: #20,990
“duty” frequency rank: 65979
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	dota	duty
Definition	Troisième personne du singulier du passé simple du verbe doter.	Devoir.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set dota and duty apart are highlighted. They share 2 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

4 ch

dota

4 ch

duty

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dota is \dɔ.ta\ while duty is \ˈdju.ti\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 65979, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dota is recorded at frequency rank #44,989, classified as averb, pronounced \dɔ.ta\. duty is at rank #20,990, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈdju.ti\.

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 65979, this pair ranks #69,878 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of dota vs duty

Shared letters: dt. Private to "dota": ao. Private to "duty": uy.

"dota" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "duty" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

dota ← ddota · doat · dotta · dtoa · odta
duty ← dduty · dtuy · dutty · dutyy · duyt · udty

Frequency comparison

dota#44,989

duty#20,990

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "dota" and "duty" be used interchangeably?

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

Which is more common, "dota" or "duty"?

"duty" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,990 in our French list, against #44,989 for "dota". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering dota vs duty

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

Check the role first: if you need a verb, it's “dota”; for a noun, it's “duty”.
See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “dota” entry
Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable