are vs AV, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#4,019
“are” frequency rank: #15,034
“AV” frequency rank: 19053
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	are	AV
Definition	2. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens des Verbs be	Abhängige Variable

Letter map: are vs AV

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

3 ch

are

2 ch

Part-of-speech tell for are / AV

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: are is averb and AVanabbrev. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19053, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

are is recorded at frequency rank #4,019, classified as averb, pronounced [ə]. AV is at rank #15,034, tagged as anabbrev, pronounced […].

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 19053, this pair ranks #1,912,290 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of are vs AV

Shared letters: a. Private to "are": er. Private to "AV": v.

"are" · 3 letters · shape VCV · "AV" · 2 letters · shape VC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "are" for "AV" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "are" is a verb and "AV" an abbrev, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Frequency check: "are" vs "AV" - which ranks higher?

"are" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,019 in our German list, against #15,034 for "AV". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "are" and "AV".

Full dictionary entry for "are" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "AV" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #1,912,290 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"are" and "AV" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "AV vs puzzles". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #1,912,290 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.