coupvsCoupéTell them apart

Which to use

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

#16,671
“coup” frequency rank
#21,213
“Coupé” frequency rank
37884
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature coup Coupé
Definition Treffen, Anschlag, Hieb, Schlag, Streich Abteil in einem Zug

Where the eye mixes coup and Coupé

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

4 ch
coup
5 ch
Coupé

Visual trap between coup and Coupé

A purely visual mix-up. coup ([ku]) and Coupé ([kuˈpeː]) 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 extra letter(s) - “coup” sits inside “Coupé”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37884, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

coup is recorded at frequency rank #16,671, classified as anoun, pronounced [ku]. Coupé is at rank #21,213, tagged as anoun, pronounced [kuˈpeː].

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 37884, this pair ranks #1,578,538 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of coup vs Coupé

Shared letters: copu. Private to "coup": -. Private to "Coupé": é.

"coup" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "Coupé" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • coupccoup · copu · coupp · cuop · ocup

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "coup" for "Coupé" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([ku] versus [kuˈpeː]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "coup" or "Coupé"?
"coup" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,671 in our German list, against #21,213 for "Coupé". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "coup" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Coupé" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,578,538 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "coup" and "Coupé" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "coli vs coup". 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 #1,578,538 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