fürnvsfürsWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#16,708
“fürn” frequency rank
#1,292
“fürs” frequency rank
18000
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature fürn fürs
Definition Kontraktion aus „für“ und „den“, wobei „den“ Akkusativ Singular Maskulinum des Definitartikels ist für das

Where the eye mixes fürn and fürs

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
fürn
4 ch
fürs

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. fürn ([fyːɐ̯n]) and fürs ([fyːɐ̯s]) 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 a single letter - n in “fürn” becomes s in “fürs”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18000, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

fürn is recorded at frequency rank #16,708, classified as anabbrev, pronounced [fyːɐ̯n]. fürs is at rank #1,292, tagged as anabbrev, pronounced [fyːɐ̯s].

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 18000, this pair ranks #1,922,334 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of fürn vs fürs

Shared letters: frü. Private to "fürn": n. Private to "fürs": s.

"fürn" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "fürs" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "fürn" and "fürs" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently ([fyːɐ̯n] versus [fyːɐ̯s]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "fürn" or "fürs"?
"fürs" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,292 in our German list, against #16,708 for "fürn". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list