bain vs bei, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#47,234
“bain” frequency rank: #29
“bei” frequency rank: 47263
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	bain	bei
Definition	Bad	in unmittelbarer Nähe

Letter map: bain vs bei

Shared letters muted; letters that set bain and bei apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch

bain

3 ch

bei

Role in the sentence - bain and bei

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: bain is anoun and beiapreposition. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47263, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bain is recorded at frequency rank #47,234, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. bei is at rank #29, tagged as aprep, pronounced [baɪ̯].

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 47263, this pair ranks #1,290,507 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bain vs bei

Shared letters: bi. Private to "bain": an. Private to "bei": e.

"bain" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "bei" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

bain ← abin · bainn · bani · bbain

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "bain" and "bei" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "bain" is a noun and "bei" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Frequency check: "bain" vs "bei" - which ranks higher?

"bei" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #29 in our German list, against #47,234 for "bain". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Pair "bain" vs "bei" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

Full dictionary entry for "bain" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "bei" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #1,290,507 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"bain" and "bei" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bain vs puzzles". 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 #1,290,507 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.