charvschezWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: char is a noun, chez is a preposition, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“char” is a noun and “chez” is a preposition - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#31,983
“char” frequency rank
#40,461
“chez” frequency rank
72444
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature char chez
Definition Fuder, Fuhre, Karren, Wagen, Fuhrwerk, Förderwagen, Hund, Hunt, Laufkatze in den (Wohn- oder Arbeits-)räumen von

Where the eye mixes char and chez

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
char
4 ch
chez

Why the eye confuses char with chez

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: char is [ʃaʁ] while chez is [ʃe]. 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 preposition), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 72444, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

char is recorded at frequency rank #31,983, classified as anoun, pronounced [ʃaʁ]. chez is at rank #40,461, tagged as aprep, pronounced [ʃe].

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 72444, this pair ranks #388,187 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of char vs chez

Shared letters: ch. Private to "char": ar. Private to "chez": ez.

"char" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "chez" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • charcahr · cchar · charr · chhar · chra · hcar
  • chezcchez · cehz · chezz · chhez · chze · hcez

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "char" and "chez" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "char" is a noun and "chez" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "char" vs "chez" - which ranks higher?
"char" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,983 in our German list, against #40,461 for "chez". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "char" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "chez" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #388,187 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "char" and "chez" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "carr vs char". 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 #388,187 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