dearvsdorWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: dear is a adjective, dor is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dear” is an adjective and “dor” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#30,506
“dear” frequency rank
#35,140
“dor” frequency rank
65646
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dear dor
Definition lieb, teuer, süß, entzückend, reizend, herzig 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs dare

Letter map: dear vs dor

Shared letters muted; letters that set dear and dor apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
dear
3 ch
dor

Grammar separator: dear vs dor

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: dear is anadjective and doraverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 65646, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dear is recorded at frequency rank #30,506, classified as anadj, pronounced [diɹ]. dor is at rank #35,140, tagged as averb, 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 65646, this pair ranks #599,765 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dear vs dor

Shared letters: dr. Private to "dear": ae. Private to "dor": o.

"dear" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "dor" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dearddear · dearr · dera · edar

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "dear" and "dor" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dear" is an adjective and "dor" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "dear" vs "dor" - which ranks higher?
"dear" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #30,506 in our German list, against #35,140 for "dor". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "dear" vs "dor" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dear" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "dor" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #599,765 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dear" and "dor" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dor 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 #599,765 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