billsvsbirdsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#48,785
“bills” frequency rank
#29,510
“birds” frequency rank
78295
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bills birds
Definition Plural des Substantivs bill Plural des Substantivs bird

Letter map: bills vs birds

Shared letters muted; letters that set bills and birds apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. bills and birds follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
bills
5 ch
birds

Pair insight - bills / birds

bills and birds are indexed as a confusable German pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 78295, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bills is recorded at frequency rank #48,785, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. birds is at rank #29,510, tagged as anoun, pronounced [bɜːdz].

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 78295, this pair ranks #241,508 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of bills vs birds

Shared letters: bis. Private to "bills": l. Private to "birds": dr.

"bills" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "birds" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bills ← bbills · billss · bils · bilsl · blils · iblls
  • birds ← bbirds · bidrs · birdds · birdss · birrds · birsd · brids · ibrds

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "bills" and "birds" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "bills" vs "birds" - which ranks higher?
"birds" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #29,510 in our German list, against #48,785 for "bills". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "bills" and "birds".

  • Full dictionary entry for "bills" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "birds" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #241,508 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bills" and "birds" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bills 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 #241,508 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