HeinvsherWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: Hein is a name, her is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Hein” is a name and “her” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#19,601
“Hein” frequency rank
#477
“her” frequency rank
20078
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Hein her
Definition männlicher Vorname Bewegung in Richtung des Sprechenden von einem entfernteren Ort aus

Where the eye mixes Hein and her

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
Hein
3 ch
her

Visual trap between Hein and her

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Hein is [haɪ̯n] while her is [heːɐ̯]. 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 (name vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 20078, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Hein is recorded at frequency rank #19,601, classified as aname, pronounced [haɪ̯n]. her is at rank #477, tagged as anadv, pronounced [heːɐ̯].

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 20078, this pair ranks #1,901,532 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Hein vs her

Shared letters: eh. Private to "Hein": in. Private to "her": r.

"Hein" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "her" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Heinehin · heinn · heni · hhein · hien

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Hein" and "her" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Hein" is a name and "her" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Hein" vs "her" - which ranks higher?
"her" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #477 in our German list, against #19,601 for "Hein". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Hein" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "her" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,901,532 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Hein" and "her" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "heel vs Hein". 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 #1,901,532 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