beavsbreakWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“bea” and “break” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#21,179
“bea” frequency rank
#11,619
“break” frequency rank
32798
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bea break
Definition trinken brechen; kaputt gehen

Where the eye mixes bea and break

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

3 ch
bea
5 ch
break

Look-alike desk: bea vs break

A purely visual mix-up. bea ([be̯a]) and break ([breɪk]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 32798, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bea is recorded at frequency rank #21,179, classified as averb, pronounced [be̯a]. break is at rank #11,619, tagged as averb, pronounced [breɪk].

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 32798, this pair ranks #1,699,789 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of bea vs break

Shared letters: abe. Private to "bea": -. Private to "break": kr.

"bea" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "break" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • breakbbreak · berak · braek · breakk · breka · brreak · rbeak

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "bea" and "break" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently ([be̯a] versus [breɪk]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "bea" or "break"?
"break" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,619 in our German list, against #21,179 for "bea". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "bea" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "break" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,699,789 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bea" and "break" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bea vs bic". 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 #1,699,789 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