ducksvsdurasWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#34,503
“ducks” frequency rank
#23,840
“duras” frequency rank
58343
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ducks duras
Definition Pluriel de duck. Cépage donnant du raisin à petits grains noirs. Il est essentiellement cultivé dans la région de Gaillac.

Where the eye mixes ducks and duras

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
ducks
5 ch
duras

Visual trap between ducks and duras

A purely visual mix-up. ducks (\ˈdʌks\) and duras (\dy.ʁa\) 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 58343, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ducks is recorded at frequency rank #34,503, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈdʌks\. duras is at rank #23,840, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dy.ʁa\.

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 58343, this pair ranks #109,616 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ducks vs duras

Shared letters: dsu. Private to "ducks": ck. Private to "duras": ar.

"ducks" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "duras" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • ducksdcuks · dducks · duccks · duckks · duckss · ducsk · dukcs · udcks
  • durasdduras · druas · duars · durass · durras · dursa · udras

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ducks" for "duras" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ˈdʌks\ versus \dy.ʁa\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "ducks" vs "duras" - which ranks higher?
"duras" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,840 in our French list, against #34,503 for "ducks". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ducks" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "duras" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #109,616 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ducks" and "duras" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ducks vs ducon". 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 #109,616 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