countriesvsofWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#41,101
“countries” frequency rank
#324
“of” frequency rank
41425
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature countries of
Definition Plural des Substantivs country von

Letter map: countries vs of

Shared letters muted; letters that set countries and of apart highlighted. Shared run: 1. countries runs 9 letters (CVVCCCVVC) against of's 2 (VC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

9 ch
countries
2 ch
of

Grammar separator: countries vs of

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: countries is anoun and ofapreposition. On the page they differ by 7 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41425, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

countries is recorded at frequency rank #41,101, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. of is at rank #324, tagged as aprep, 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 41425, this pair ranks #1,479,825 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of countries vs of

Shared letters: o. Private to "countries": ceinrstu. Private to "of": f.

"countries" · 9 letters · shape CVVCCCVVC  ·  "of" · 2 letters · shape VC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • countries ← ccountries · conutries · counntries · counrties · countires · countreis · countriess · countrise

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "countries" for "of" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "countries" is a noun and "of" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "countries" or "of" show up more?
"of" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #324 in our German list, against #41,101 for "countries". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

You've compared "countries" and "of". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "countries" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "of" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,479,825 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "countries" and "of" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "countries vs puzzles". 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 #1,479,825 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