Which to use
“duels” and “durées” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #20,702
- “duels” frequency rank
- #20,424
- “durées” frequency rank
- 41126
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | duels | durées |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pluriel de duel. | Pluriel de durée. |
Where the eye mixes duels and durées
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. duels runs 5 letters (CVVCC) against durées's 6 (CVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: duels vs durées
A purely visual mix-up. duels (\dɥɛl\) and durées (\dy.ʁe\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41126, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
duels is recorded at frequency rank #20,702, classified as anoun, pronounced \dɥɛl\. durées is at rank #20,424, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dy.ʁe\.
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 41126, this pair ranks #235,399 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of duels vs durées
Shared letters: desu. Private to "duels": l. Private to "durées": ré.
"duels" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC · "durées" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- duels ← dduels · deuls · duells · duelss · duesl · dules · udels
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "duels" and "durées" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "duels" or "durées" show up more?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "duels" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "durées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #235,399 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "duels" and "durées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "diurnes vs durées". 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 #235,399 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.