DrachevsdrückeWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: Drache is a noun, drücke is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Drache” is a noun and “drücke” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#14,269
“Drache” frequency rank
#10,636
“drücke” frequency rank
24905
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Drache drücke
Definition großes Mischwesen, meist geflügelt, feuerspeiend und mit großen Klauen, das einer Schlange oder Echse ähnelt 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs drücken

Where the eye mixes Drache and drücke

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. Drache and drücke follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
Drache
6 ch
drücke

Visual trap between Drache and drücke

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Drache is [ˈdʁaxə] while drücke is [ˈdʁʏkə]. 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 (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24905, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Drache is recorded at frequency rank #14,269, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈdʁaxə]. drücke is at rank #10,636, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈdʁʏkə].

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 24905, this pair ranks #1,840,936 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Drache vs drücke

Shared letters: cder. Private to "Drache": ah. Private to "drücke": kü.

"Drache" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV  ·  "drücke" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Drache ← darche · ddrache · dracche · draceh · drachhe · drahce · drcahe · drrache

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Drache" and "drücke" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Drache" is a noun and "drücke" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Drache" vs "drücke" - which ranks higher?
"drücke" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,636 in our German list, against #14,269 for "Drache". 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 "Drache" and "drücke" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Drache" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "drücke" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,840,936 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Drache" and "drücke" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Deiche vs Drache". 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 #1,840,936 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