Which to use
“Alban” is a name and “albern” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #35,607
- “Alban” frequency rank
- #11,585
- “albern” frequency rank
- 47192
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | Alban | albern |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | männlicher Vorname | in unpassender und dummer Art lustig |
Where the eye mixes Alban and albern
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. Alban runs 5 letters (VCCVC) against albern's 6 (VCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: Alban vs albern
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Alban is [ˈalbaːn] while albern is [ˈalbɐn]. 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 (name vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47192, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
Alban is recorded at frequency rank #35,607, classified as aname, pronounced [ˈalbaːn]. albern is at rank #11,585, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈalbɐn].
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 47192, this pair ranks #1,293,056 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of Alban vs albern
Shared letters: abln. Private to "Alban": -. Private to "albern": er.
"Alban" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC · "albern" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "Alban" for "albern" ever safe?
Frequency check: "Alban" vs "albern" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "Alban" and "albern" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "Alban" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "albern" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #1,293,056 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "Alban" and "albern" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Alban vs Amman". 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 #1,293,056 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.