durantvsduringTell them apart

Which to use

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

#670
“durant” frequency rank
#33,227
“during” frequency rank
33897
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature durant during
Definition Tout au long de. Durant, pendant, lors de.

Where the eye mixes durant and during

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. durant and during follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
durant
6 ch
during

Why the eye confuses durant with during

A purely visual mix-up. durant (\dy.ʁɑ̃\) and during (\ˈdʒʊə.ɹɪŋ\) 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 33897, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

durant is recorded at frequency rank #670, classified as aprep, pronounced \dy.ʁɑ̃\. during is at rank #33,227, tagged as aprep, pronounced \ˈdʒʊə.ɹɪŋ\.

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 33897, this pair ranks #287,535 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of durant vs during

Shared letters: dnru. Private to "durant": at. Private to "during": gi.

"durant" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC  ·  "during" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • durant ← ddurant · druant · duarnt · durannt · durantt · duratn · durnat · durrant
  • during ← dduring · druing · duirng · durign · duringg · durinng · durnig · durring

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "durant" and "during" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\dy.ʁɑ̃\ versus \ˈdʒʊə.ɹɪŋ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "durant" or "during" show up more?
"durant" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #670 in our French list, against #33,227 for "during". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "durant" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "during" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #287,535 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "durant" and "during" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "doing vs during". 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 #287,535 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