FellvsfettWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Fell is a noun, fett is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Fell” is a noun and “fett” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#8,708
“Fell” frequency rank
#3,032
“fett” frequency rank
11740
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Fell fett
Definition die behaarte Haut eines Tieres dick aufgrund von Fett im Körper

Where the eye mixes Fell and fett

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. Fell and fett follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
Fell
4 ch
fett

Visual trap between Fell and fett

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Fell is [fɛl] while fett is [fɛt]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11740, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Fell is recorded at frequency rank #8,708, classified as anoun, pronounced [fɛl]. fett is at rank #3,032, tagged as anadj, pronounced [fɛt].

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 11740, this pair ranks #1,968,187 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Fell vs fett

Shared letters: ef. Private to "Fell": l. Private to "fett": t.

"Fell" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "fett" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Fellefll · fel · ffell · flel
  • fetteftt · fet · ffett · ftet

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Fell" for "fett" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Fell" is a noun and "fett" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Fell" or "fett"?
"fett" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,032 in our German list, against #8,708 for "Fell". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Fell" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fett" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,968,187 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Fell" and "fett" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Fell vs fils". 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 #1,968,187 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