fasstvsfastWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: fasst is a verb, fast is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“fasst” is a verb and “fast” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#6,181
“fasst” frequency rank
#243
“fast” frequency rank
6424
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature fasst fast
Definition 2. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs fassen nicht ganz

Same sound, different letters: fasst vs fast

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 4 letters. fasst runs 5 letters (CVCCC) against fast's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
fasst
4 ch
fast

Same sound, different spelling - fasst / fast

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: fasst and fast carry the same recorded pronunciation, [fast]. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is averb, the other anadverb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 6424, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

fasst is recorded at frequency rank #6,181, classified as averb, pronounced [fast]. fast is at rank #243, tagged as anadv, pronounced [fast].

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 6424, this pair ranks #1,991,684 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of fasst vs fast

Shared letters: afst. Private to "fasst": -. Private to "fast": -.

"fasst" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "fast" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • fasstafsst · fasstt · fasts · faßt · ffasst · fsast
  • fastafst · fastt · fats · ffast · fsat

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "fasst" for "fast" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "fasst" is a verb and "fast" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "fasst" or "fast"?
"fast" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #243 in our German list, against #6,181 for "fasst". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "fasst" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fast" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,991,684 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "fasst" and "fast" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fasst vs fist". 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 #1,991,684 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