GürtelvsgutemWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#8,217
“Gürtel” frequency rank
#4,125
“gutem” frequency rank
12342
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Gürtel gutem
Definition ein um den Körper getragenes Band, das zum Zusammenhalt von Kleidung dient Dativ Singular Maskulinum Positiv der starken Flexion des Adjektivs gut

Where the eye mixes Gürtel and gutem

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

6 ch
Gürtel
5 ch
gutem

Visual trap between Gürtel and gutem

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Gürtel is [ˈɡʏʁtl̩] while gutem is [ˈɡuːtəm]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12342, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Gürtel is recorded at frequency rank #8,217, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈɡʏʁtl̩]. gutem is at rank #4,125, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈɡuːtəm].

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 12342, this pair ranks #1,964,728 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Gürtel vs gutem

Shared letters: egt. Private to "Gürtel": lrü. Private to "gutem": mu.

"Gürtel" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "gutem" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • gutem ← ggutem · gtuem · guetm · gutemm · gutme · guttem · ugtem

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Gürtel" for "gutem" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Gürtel" is a noun and "gutem" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Gürtel" or "gutem"?
"gutem" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,125 in our German list, against #8,217 for "Gürtel". 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 "Gürtel" and "gutem" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Gürtel" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "gutem" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,964,728 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Gürtel" and "gutem" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Gürtel vs Gustl". 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 #1,964,728 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