dessvsDosisWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: dess is a unknown, Dosis is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dess” is an unknown and “Dosis” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#48,817
“dess” frequency rank
#8,346
“Dosis” frequency rank
57163
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dess Dosis
Definition 3. Person Utrum Singular Genitiv des Personalpronomens den genau abgemessene Menge eines Medikaments

Where the eye mixes dess and Dosis

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

4 ch
dess
5 ch
Dosis

Visual trap between dess and Dosis

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dess is [ˈdɛ̝sː] while Dosis is [ˈdoːzɪs]. 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 (unknown vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57163, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dess is recorded at frequency rank #48,817, classified as anunknown, pronounced [ˈdɛ̝sː]. Dosis is at rank #8,346, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈdoːzɪs].

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 57163, this pair ranks #912,031 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dess vs Dosis

Shared letters: ds. Private to "dess": e. Private to "Dosis": io.

"dess" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "Dosis" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dessddess · deß · dses · edss
  • Dosisddosis · doiss · dosiss · dossi · dossis · dsois · odsis

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "dess" for "Dosis" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dess" is an unknown and "Dosis" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "dess" vs "Dosis" - which ranks higher?
"Dosis" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,346 in our German list, against #48,817 for "dess". 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 "dess" and "Dosis" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dess" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Dosis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #912,031 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dess" and "Dosis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dess vs dew". 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 #912,031 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