druntervsdünnerTell them apart

Quick tell: drunter is a adverb, dünner is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“drunter” is an adverb and “dünner” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,031
“drunter” frequency rank
#13,580
“dünner” frequency rank
24611
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature drunter dünner
Definition darunter Nominativ Singular Maskulinum der starken Flexion des Positivs des Adjektivs dünn

Where the eye mixes drunter and dünner

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

7 ch
drunter
6 ch
dünner

Why the eye confuses drunter with dünner

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: drunter is [ˈdʁʊntɐ] while dünner is [ˈdʏnɐ]. 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 (adverb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24611, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

drunter is recorded at frequency rank #11,031, classified as anadv, pronounced [ˈdʁʊntɐ]. dünner is at rank #13,580, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈdʏnɐ].

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 24611, this pair ranks #1,845,185 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of drunter vs dünner

Shared letters: denr. Private to "drunter": tu. Private to "dünner": ü.

"drunter" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC  ·  "dünner" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • drunterddrunter · drnuter · drrunter · drunetr · drunnter · drunterr · druntre · druntter

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "drunter" and "dünner" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "drunter" is an adverb and "dünner" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "drunter" or "dünner"?
"drunter" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,031 in our German list, against #13,580 for "dünner". 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 "drunter" and "dünner" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "drunter" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "dünner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,845,185 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "drunter" and "dünner" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Düne vs dünner". 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 #1,845,185 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