awayvsborisWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: away is a adverb, boris is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“away” is an adverb and “boris” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#15,565
“away” frequency rank
#6,774
“boris” frequency rank
22339
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature away boris
Definition weg, fort, abwesend Indikativ Präteritum Aktiv des Verbs bori

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set away and boris apart are highlighted. They share no common letter run, the confusion here is by sound, not by sight.

4 ch
away
5 ch
boris

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: away is anadverb and borisaverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22339, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

away is recorded at frequency rank #15,565, classified as anadv, pronounced […]. boris is at rank #6,774, tagged as averb, 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 22339, this pair ranks #1,875,370 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of away vs boris

Shared letters: none. Private to "away": awy. Private to "boris": biors.

"away" · 4 letters · shape VCVV  ·  "boris" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • awayaawy · awayy · awway · awya · waay
  • borisbboris · boirs · boriss · borris · borsi · brois · obris

Frequency comparison

away#15,565
boris#6,774

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "away" and "boris" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "away" is an adverb and "boris" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "away" or "boris"?
"boris" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,774 in our German list, against #15,565 for "away". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering away vs boris

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Check the role first: if you need an adverb, it's “away”; for a verb, it's “boris”.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “away” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list