drevsdroheTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#36,889
“dre” frequency rank
#34,050
“drohe” frequency rank
70939
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dre drohe
Definition der Hirsch 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs drohen

Where the eye mixes dre and drohe

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

3 ch
dre
5 ch
drohe

Why the eye confuses dre with drohe

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dre is [dreː] while drohe is [ˈdʁoːə]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 70939, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dre is recorded at frequency rank #36,889, classified as anoun, pronounced [dreː]. drohe is at rank #34,050, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈdʁoːə].

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 70939, this pair ranks #431,377 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of dre vs drohe

Shared letters: der. Private to "dre": -. Private to "drohe": ho.

"dre" · 3 letters · shape CCV  ·  "drohe" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • droheddrohe · dorhe · drhoe · droeh · drohhe · drrohe · rdohe

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "dre" and "drohe" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dre" is a noun and "drohe" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "dre" vs "drohe" - which ranks higher?
"drohe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #34,050 in our German list, against #36,889 for "dre". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "drohe" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #431,377 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dre" and "drohe" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dörr vs dre". 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 #431,377 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