dankevsDingeWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: danke is a particle, Dinge is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“danke” is a particle and “Dinge” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#212
“danke” frequency rank
#516
“Dinge” frequency rank
728
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature danke Dinge
Definition Wort, das man benutzt, um seinen Dank auszudrücken Nominativ Plural des Substantivs Ding

Where the eye mixes danke and Dinge

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

5 ch
danke
5 ch
Dinge

Visual trap between danke and Dinge

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: danke is [ˈdaŋkə] while Dinge is [ˈdɪŋə]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (particle vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 728, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

danke is recorded at frequency rank #212, classified as aparticle, pronounced [ˈdaŋkə]. Dinge is at rank #516, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈdɪŋə].

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 728, this pair ranks #2,005,440 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of danke vs Dinge

Shared letters: den. Private to "danke": ak. Private to "Dinge": gi.

"danke" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "Dinge" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dankeadnke · dakne · danek · dankke · dannke · ddanke · dnake
  • Dingeddinge · digne · dineg · dingge · dinnge · dnige · idnge

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "danke" and "Dinge" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "danke" is a particle and "Dinge" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "danke" or "Dinge" show up more?
"danke" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #212 in our German list, against #516 for "Dinge". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "danke" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Dinge" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,005,440 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "danke" and "Dinge" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Dinge vs Düne". 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 #2,005,440 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