chervsclearWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#21,929
“cher” frequency rank
#27,240
“clear” frequency rank
49169
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cher clear
Definition teuer, hold, lieb, wert klar

Where the eye mixes cher and clear

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
cher
5 ch
clear

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. cher ([ʃɛʁ]) and clear ([klɪə]) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49169, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cher is recorded at frequency rank #21,929, classified as anadj, pronounced [ʃɛʁ]. clear is at rank #27,240, tagged as anadj, pronounced [klɪə].

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 49169, this pair ranks #1,221,552 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cher vs clear

Shared letters: cer. Private to "cher": h. Private to "clear": al.

"cher" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "clear" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cherccher · cehr · cherr · chher · chre · hcer
  • clearcclear · celar · claer · clearr · clera · cllear · lcear

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "cher" and "clear" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently ([ʃɛʁ] versus [klɪə]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "cher" or "clear"?
"cher" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #21,929 in our German list, against #27,240 for "clear". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list