begehrenvsbegehrtWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: begehren is a verb, begehrt is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“begehren” is a verb and “begehrt” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#18,828
“begehren” frequency rank
#11,820
“begehrt” frequency rank
30648
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature begehren begehrt
Definition nach jemandem oder etwas großes (sexuelles) Verlangen haben, jemanden oder etwas sehr gern haben wollen eine von vielen verlangte Person oder Sache

Where the eye mixes begehren and begehrt

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. begehren runs 8 letters (CVCVCCVC) against begehrt's 7 (CVCVCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
begehren
7 ch
begehrt

Why the eye confuses begehren with begehrt

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: begehren is [bəˈɡeːʁən] while begehrt is [bəˈɡeːɐ̯t]. 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 (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 30648, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

begehren is recorded at frequency rank #18,828, classified as averb, pronounced [bəˈɡeːʁən]. begehrt is at rank #11,820, tagged as anadj, pronounced [bəˈɡeːɐ̯t].

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 30648, this pair ranks #1,743,784 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of begehren vs begehrt

Shared letters: beghr. Private to "begehren": n. Private to "begehrt": t.

"begehren" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCCVC  ·  "begehrt" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • begehren ← bbegehren · beeghren · begehern · begehhren · begehrenn · begehrne · begehrren · begerhen
  • begehrt ← bbegehrt · beeghrt · begehhrt · begehrrt · begehrtt · begehtr · begerht · beggehrt

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "begehren" and "begehrt" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "begehren" is a verb and "begehrt" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "begehren" vs "begehrt" - which ranks higher?
"begehrt" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,820 in our German list, against #18,828 for "begehren". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "begehren" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "begehrt" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,743,784 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "begehren" and "begehrt" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "begehren vs bekehren". 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 #1,743,784 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