Which to use
“der” is a determiner and “dess” is an unknown - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #2
- “der” frequency rank
- #48,817
- “dess” frequency rank
- 48819
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | der | dess |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | definiter Artikel (bestimmtes Geschlechtswort) | 3. Person Utrum Singular Genitiv des Personalpronomens den |
Where the eye mixes der and dess
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: der is [deːɐ̯] while dess is [ˈdɛ̝sː]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (determiner vs unknown), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48819, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
der is recorded at frequency rank #2, classified as adet, pronounced [deːɐ̯]. dess is at rank #48,817, tagged as anunknown, pronounced [ˈdɛ̝sː].
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 48819, this pair ranks #1,234,468 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of der vs dess
Shared letters: de. Private to "der": r. Private to "dess": s.
"der" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "dess" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
- dess ← ddess · deß · dses · edss