charvsClanTell them apart

Which to use

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

#31,983
“char” frequency rank
#9,695
“Clan” frequency rank
41678
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature char Clan
Definition Fuder, Fuhre, Karren, Wagen, Fuhrwerk, Förderwagen, Hund, Hunt, Laufkatze (schottischer/irischer) Stammes-/Volksverband

Where the eye mixes char and Clan

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

4 ch
char
4 ch
Clan

Why the eye confuses char with Clan

A purely visual mix-up. char ([ʃaʁ]) and Clan ([klaːn]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41678, 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]. Clan is at rank #9,695, tagged as anoun, pronounced [klaːn].

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 41678, this pair ranks #1,472,308 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of char vs Clan

Shared letters: ac. Private to "char": hr. Private to "Clan": ln.

"char" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "Clan" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • charcahr · cchar · charr · chhar · chra · hcar
  • Clancaln · cclan · clann · cllan · clna · lcan

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "char" for "Clan" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([ʃaʁ] versus [klaːn]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary German text, does "char" or "Clan" show up more?
"Clan" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,695 in our German list, against #31,983 for "char". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "char" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Clan" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,472,308 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "char" and "Clan" 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 #1,472,308 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