Which to use
“Furcht” is a noun and “fürchten” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #8,055
- “Furcht” frequency rank
- #5,172
- “fürchten” frequency rank
- 13227
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | Furcht | fürchten |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Emotion angesichts drohender Gefahr | etwas fürchten: vor etwas Angst (Furcht) haben |
Where the eye mixes Furcht and fürchten
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. Furcht runs 6 letters (CVCCCC) against fürchten's 8 (CVCCCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: Furcht vs fürchten
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Furcht is [fʊʁçt] while fürchten is [ˈfʏʁçtn̩]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13227, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
Furcht is recorded at frequency rank #8,055, classified as anoun, pronounced [fʊʁçt]. fürchten is at rank #5,172, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈfʏʁçtn̩].
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 13227, this pair ranks #1,959,298 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of Furcht vs fürchten
Shared letters: cfhrt. Private to "Furcht": u. Private to "fürchten": enü.
"Furcht" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCC · "fürchten" · 8 letters · shape CVCCCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- Furcht ← ffurcht · fucrht · furccht · furchht · furchtt · furcth · furhct · furrcht
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "Furcht" for "fürchten" ever safe?
Which is more common, "Furcht" or "fürchten"?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "Furcht" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "fürchten" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #1,959,298 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "Furcht" and "fürchten" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fischt vs Furcht". 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 #1,959,298 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.