AmmevsarteWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: Amme is a noun, arte is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Amme” is a noun and “arte” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#41,639
“Amme” frequency rank
#8,333
“arte” frequency rank
49972
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Amme arte
Definition eine ein fremdes Kind stillende und betreuende Frau 2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs arten

Where the eye mixes Amme and arte

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. Amme and arte follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
Amme
4 ch
arte

Visual trap between Amme and arte

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Amme is [ˈamə] while arte is [ˈaːɐ̯tə]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49972, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Amme is recorded at frequency rank #41,639, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈamə]. arte is at rank #8,333, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈaːɐ̯tə].

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 49972, this pair ranks #1,191,460 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Amme vs arte

Shared letters: ae. Private to "Amme": m. Private to "arte": rt.

"Amme" · 4 letters · shape VCCV  ·  "arte" · 4 letters · shape VCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Amme ← ame · amem · mame
  • arte ← aret · arrte · artte · atre

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Amme" and "arte" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Amme" is a noun and "arte" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Amme" or "arte" show up more?
"arte" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,333 in our German list, against #41,639 for "Amme". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Amme" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "arte" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,191,460 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Amme" and "arte" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Amme 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 #1,191,460 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