AktevsaltesWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Akte is a noun, altes is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#8,506
“Akte” frequency rank
#3,501
“altes” frequency rank
12007
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Akte altes
Definition Sammlung von Aufzeichnungen, die inhaltlich zusammengehören Nominativ Singular Neutrum Positiv der starken Flexion des Adjektivs alt

Where the eye mixes Akte and altes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Akte runs 4 letters (VCCV) against altes's 5 (VCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
Akte
5 ch
altes

Look-alike desk: Akte vs altes

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Akte is [ˈaktə] while altes is [ˈaltəs]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12007, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Akte is recorded at frequency rank #8,506, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈaktə]. altes is at rank #3,501, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈaltəs].

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 12007, this pair ranks #1,966,699 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Akte vs altes

Shared letters: aet. Private to "Akte": k. Private to "altes": ls.

"Akte" · 4 letters · shape VCCV  ·  "altes" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Akte ← aket · akkte · aktte · atke · kate
  • altes ← alets · alltes · altess · altse · alttes · atles · lates

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Akte" and "altes" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Akte" is a noun and "altes" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Akte" or "altes"?
"altes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,501 in our German list, against #8,506 for "Akte". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "Akte" and "altes" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Akte" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "altes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,966,699 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Akte" and "altes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Akte vs Atze". 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 #1,966,699 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list