geravsmerchTell them apart

Quick tell: gera is a verb, merch is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“gera” is a verb and “merch” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#12,085
“gera” frequency rank
#34,807
“merch” frequency rank
46892
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature gera merch
Definition tun Tochter

Letter map: gera vs merch

Shared letters muted; letters that set gera and merch apart highlighted. Shared run: 2. gera runs 4 letters (CVCV) against merch's 5 (CVCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
gera
5 ch
merch

Grammar separator: gera vs merch

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: gera is averb and merchanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46892, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

gera is recorded at frequency rank #12,085, classified as averb, pronounced […]. merch is at rank #34,807, tagged as anoun, 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 46892, this pair ranks #1,303,359 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of gera vs merch

Shared letters: er. Private to "gera": ag. Private to "merch": chm.

"gera" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "merch" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • geraegra · gerra · ggera · grea
  • merchemrch · mecrh · mercch · merchh · merhc · merrch · mmerch · mrech

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "gera" and "merch" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "gera" is a verb and "merch" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "gera" or "merch" show up more?
"gera" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,085 in our German list, against #34,807 for "merch". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "gera" and "merch". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "gera" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "merch" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,303,359 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "gera" and "merch" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "merch 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 #1,303,359 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