feelvsfeyWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: feel is a verb, fey is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“feel” is a verb and “fey” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#14,800
“feel” frequency rank
#43,868
“fey” frequency rank
58668
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature feel fey
Definition fühlen, spüren (aus dem schottischen) todgeweiht

Letter map: feel vs fey

Shared letters muted; letters that set feel and fey apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
feel
3 ch
fey

Grammar separator: feel vs fey

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: feel is averb and feyanadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58668, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

feel is recorded at frequency rank #14,800, classified as averb, pronounced [fiːl]. fey is at rank #43,868, tagged as anadj, pronounced […].

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 58668, this pair ranks #853,858 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of feel vs fey

Shared letters: ef. Private to "feel": l. Private to "fey": y.

"feel" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "fey" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • feelefel · feell · fele · ffeel

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "feel" and "fey" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "feel" is a verb and "fey" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "feel" or "fey" show up more?
"feel" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,800 in our German list, against #43,868 for "fey". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "feel" and "fey".

  • Full dictionary entry for "feel" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fey" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #853,858 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "feel" and "fey" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fey vs puzzles". 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 #853,858 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