eintreffenvseintretenWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“eintreffen” and “eintreten” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#11,040
“eintreffen” frequency rank
#7,459
“eintreten” frequency rank
18499
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature eintreffen eintreten
Definition ankommen, nach einer Reise am geplanten Ziel ankommen eintreten in …; Hilfsverb „sein:“ einen Raum betreten

Where the eye mixes eintreffen and eintreten

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 8 letters in sequence.

10 ch
eintreffen
9 ch
eintreten

Visual trap between eintreffen and eintreten

A purely visual mix-up. eintreffen ([ˈaɪ̯nˌtʁɛfn̩]) and eintreten ([ˈaɪ̯nˌtʁeːtn̩]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18499, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

eintreffen is recorded at frequency rank #11,040, classified as averb, pronounced [ˈaɪ̯nˌtʁɛfn̩]. eintreten is at rank #7,459, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈaɪ̯nˌtʁeːtn̩].

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 18499, this pair ranks #1,917,616 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of eintreffen vs eintreten

Shared letters: einrt. Private to "eintreffen": f. Private to "eintreten": -.

"eintreffen" · 10 letters · shape VVCCCVCCVC  ·  "eintreten" · 9 letters · shape VVCCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • eintreffeneinntreffen · einrteffen · einterffen · eintrefefn · eintrefen · eintreffenn · eintreffne · eintrfefen
  • eintreteneinntreten · einrteten · einterten · eintreetn · eintretenn · eintretne · eintretten · eintrreten

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "eintreffen" and "eintreten" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently ([ˈaɪ̯nˌtʁɛfn̩] versus [ˈaɪ̯nˌtʁeːtn̩]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary German text, does "eintreffen" or "eintreten" show up more?
"eintreten" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,459 in our German list, against #11,040 for "eintreffen". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "eintreffen" and "eintreten" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "eintreffen" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "eintreten" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,917,616 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "eintreffen" and "eintreten" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "eintreffen vs eintreiben". 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 #1,917,616 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