clouvscomConfusable pair

Quick tell: clou is a noun, com is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“clou” is a noun and “com” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#39,272
“clou” frequency rank
#10,445
“com” frequency rank
49717
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clou com
Definition Nagel wie

Letter map: clou vs com

Shared letters muted; letters that set clou and com apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
clou
3 ch
com

Part-of-speech tell for clou / com

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: clou is anoun and comanadverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49717, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clou is recorded at frequency rank #39,272, classified as anoun, pronounced [klu]. com is at rank #10,445, tagged as anadv, pronounced […].

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 49717, this pair ranks #1,200,920 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of clou vs com

Shared letters: co. Private to "clou": lu. Private to "com": m.

"clou" · 4 letters · shape CCVV  ·  "com" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cloucclou · cllou · cluo · colu · lcou

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "clou" for "com" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "clou" is a noun and "com" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "clou" vs "com" - which ranks higher?
"com" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,445 in our German list, against #39,272 for "clou". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "clou" and "com".

  • Full dictionary entry for "clou" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "com" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,200,920 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clou" and "com" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "clock vs clou". 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 #1,200,920 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