apivsareTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#20,828
“api” frequency rank
#4,019
“are” frequency rank
24847
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature api are
Definition Feuer; Hitze und Licht, das von etwas ausgeht, das brennt 2. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens des Verbs be

Letter map: api vs are

Shared letters muted; letters that set api and are apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch
api
3 ch
are

Part-of-speech tell for api / are

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: api is anoun and areaverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24847, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

api is recorded at frequency rank #20,828, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. are is at rank #4,019, tagged as averb, pronounced [ə].

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 24847, this pair ranks #1,841,797 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of api vs are

Shared letters: a. Private to "api": ip. Private to "are": er.

"api" · 3 letters · shape VCV  ·  "are" · 3 letters · shape VCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "api" and "are" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "api" is a noun and "are" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "api" or "are" show up more?
"are" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,019 in our German list, against #20,828 for "api". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "api" and "are". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "api" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "are" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,841,797 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "api" and "are" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "api vs puzzles". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #1,841,797 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