FurchtvsFürstConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#8,055
“Furcht” frequency rank
#5,834
“Fürst” frequency rank
13889
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Furcht Fürst
Definition Emotion angesichts drohender Gefahr hoher Adliger im Rang zwischen Graf und Herzog

Where the eye mixes Furcht and Fürst

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Furcht runs 6 letters (CVCCCC) against Fürst's 5 (CVCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
Furcht
5 ch
Fürst

Visual trap between Furcht and Fürst

A purely visual mix-up. Furcht ([fʊʁçt]) and Fürst ([fʏʁst]) 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 13889, 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]. Fürst is at rank #5,834, tagged as anoun, pronounced [fʏʁst].

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 13889, this pair ranks #1,954,990 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Furcht vs Fürst

Shared letters: frt. Private to "Furcht": chu. Private to "Fürst": sü.

"Furcht" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCC  ·  "Fürst" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Furcht ← ffurcht · fucrht · furccht · furchht · furchtt · furcth · furhct · furrcht

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Furcht" and "Fürst" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently ([fʊʁçt] versus [fʏʁst]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary German text, does "Furcht" or "Fürst" show up more?
"Fürst" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,834 in our German list, against #8,055 for "Furcht". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Furcht" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Fürst" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,954,990 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Furcht" and "Fürst" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fist vs Fürst". 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 #1,954,990 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