Which to use
“blau” and “blauer” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,871
- “blau” frequency rank
- #11,197
- “blauer” frequency rank
- 13068
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | blau | blauer |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | eine bunte Farbe, im Spektrum eine relativ kurzwellige Farbe zwischen grün und violett; Grundfarbe vieler Farbmodelle, insbesondere eine der drei Grundfarben des digitalen RGB-Farbraums | Nominativ Singular Maskulinum Positiv der starken Flexion des Adjektivs blau |
Where the eye mixes blau and blauer
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between blau and blauer
A purely visual mix-up. blau ([blaʊ̯]) and blauer ([ˈblaʊ̯ɐ]) 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 extra letter(s) - “blau” sits inside “blauer”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13068, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
blau is recorded at frequency rank #1,871, classified as anadj, pronounced [blaʊ̯]. blauer is at rank #11,197, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈblaʊ̯ɐ].
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 13068, this pair ranks #1,960,313 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of blau vs blauer
Shared letters: ablu. Private to "blau": -. Private to "blauer": er.
"blau" · 4 letters · shape CCVV · "blauer" · 6 letters · shape CCVVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "blau" and "blauer" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "blau" or "blauer"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "blau" and "blauer" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "blau" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "blauer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #1,960,313 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "blau" and "blauer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Bauers vs blauer". 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 #1,960,313 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.