GrausvsgriesWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#43,228
“Graus” frequency rank
#47,460
“gries” frequency rank
90688
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Graus gries
Definition etwas entsetzlich Fürchterliches grau, grauhaarig oder trübe beim Wetter

Where the eye mixes Graus and gries

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

5 ch
Graus
5 ch
gries

Look-alike desk: Graus vs gries

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Graus is [ɡʁaʊ̯s] while gries is [ɡʁiːs]. 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 90688, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Graus is recorded at frequency rank #43,228, classified as anoun, pronounced [ɡʁaʊ̯s]. gries is at rank #47,460, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ɡʁiːs].

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 90688, this pair ranks #44,649 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Graus vs gries

Shared letters: grs. Private to "Graus": au. Private to "gries": ei.

"Graus" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC  ·  "gries" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Grausgarus · ggraus · grasu · grauss · grraus · gruas · rgaus
  • griesggries · gires · griess · grise · grries · rgies

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Graus" and "gries" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Graus" is a noun and "gries" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Graus" or "gries" show up more?
"Graus" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #43,228 in our German list, against #47,460 for "gries". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Graus" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "gries" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #44,649 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Graus" and "gries" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "gries vs Grimms". 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 #44,649 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