durvsdursWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: dur is a adjective, durs is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dur” is an adjective and “durs” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#940
“dur” frequency rank
#6,699
“durs” frequency rank
7639
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dur durs
Definition Ferme ; difficile à pénétrer ou à entamer. Le bagne.

Same sound, different letters: dur vs durs

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 3 letters.

3 ch
dur
4 ch
durs

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: dur and durs carry the same recorded pronunciation, \dyʁ\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other anoun, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “dur” sits inside “durs”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7639, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dur is recorded at frequency rank #940, classified as anadj, pronounced \dyʁ\. durs is at rank #6,699, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dyʁ\.

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 7639, this pair ranks #422,572 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of dur vs durs

Shared letters: dru. Private to "dur": -. Private to "durs": s.

"dur" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "durs" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dursddurs · drus · durrs · durss · dusr · udrs

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "dur" and "durs" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dur" is an adjective and "durs" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "dur" or "durs"?
"dur" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #940 in our French list, against #6,699 for "durs". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "dur" and "durs". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dur" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "durs" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #422,572 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dur" and "durs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "durs vs dust". 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

PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list