BesenvsbewegWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Besen is a noun, beweg is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Besen” is a noun and “beweg” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#17,533
“Besen” frequency rank
#48,002
“beweg” frequency rank
65535
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Besen beweg
Definition Arbeitsgerät zur Reinigung, auf welchem Borsten (aus Tierhaar oder Kunststoff) auf einem Träger, Schaft (aus Holz, Kunststoff oder Metall) aufgebracht und das mit einem Stiel versehen ist; in der einfachsten Form Reisigbündel, Rutenbündel oder Strohbündel mit oder ohne Stiel 2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs bewegen

Where the eye mixes Besen and beweg

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Besen and beweg follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
Besen
5 ch
beweg

Look-alike desk: Besen vs beweg

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Besen is [ˈbeːzn̩] while beweg is [bəˈveːk]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 65535, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Besen is recorded at frequency rank #17,533, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈbeːzn̩]. beweg is at rank #48,002, tagged as averb, pronounced [bəˈveːk].

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 65535, this pair ranks #603,526 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Besen vs beweg

Shared letters: be. Private to "Besen": ns. Private to "beweg": gw.

"Besen" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "beweg" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Besen ← bbesen · beesn · besenn · besne · bessen · bseen · ebsen
  • beweg ← bbeweg · beewg · bewegg · bewge · bewweg · bweeg · ebweg

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Besen" for "beweg" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Besen" is a noun and "beweg" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Besen" or "beweg" show up more?
"Besen" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,533 in our German list, against #48,002 for "beweg". 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 "Besen" and "beweg" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Besen" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "beweg" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #603,526 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Besen" and "beweg" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "beweg vs bewegst". 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 #603,526 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