aprèsvsArrestTell them apart

Quick tell: après is a preposition, Arrest is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“après” is a preposition and “Arrest” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#42,342
“après” frequency rank
#28,519
“Arrest” frequency rank
70861
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature après Arrest
Definition Relation, bei der das mitnach nach eine Haft von kurzer Dauer

Where the eye mixes après and Arrest

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. après runs 5 letters (VCCVC) against Arrest's 6 (VCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
après
6 ch
Arrest

Look-alike desk: après vs Arrest

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: après is [a.pʁɛ] while Arrest is [aˈʁɛst]. 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 (preposition vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 70861, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

après is recorded at frequency rank #42,342, classified as aprep, pronounced [a.pʁɛ]. Arrest is at rank #28,519, tagged as anoun, pronounced [aˈʁɛst].

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 70861, this pair ranks #433,711 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of après vs Arrest

Shared letters: ars. Private to "après": pè. Private to "Arrest": et.

"après" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC  ·  "Arrest" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Arrest ← arerst · arest · arresst · arrestt · arrets · arrset · rarest

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "après" for "Arrest" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "après" is a preposition and "Arrest" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "après" or "Arrest" show up more?
"Arrest" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #28,519 in our German list, against #42,342 for "après". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "après" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Arrest" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #433,711 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "après" and "Arrest" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "apel vs après". 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 #433,711 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