hinterevshintermConfusable pair

Quick tell: hintere is a adjective, hinterm is an abbrev, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“hintere” is an adjective and “hinterm” is an abbrev - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,861
“hintere” frequency rank
#14,326
“hinterm” frequency rank
28187
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hintere hinterm
Definition Nominativ Singular Femininum Positiv der starken Flexion des Adjektivs hinter hinter dem

Where the eye mixes hintere and hinterm

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence.

7 ch
hintere
7 ch
hinterm

Why the eye confuses hintere with hinterm

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: hintere is [ˈhɪntəʁə] while hinterm is [ˈhɪntɐm]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - e in “hintere” becomes m in “hinterm”, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs abbrev), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 28187, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hintere is recorded at frequency rank #13,861, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈhɪntəʁə]. hinterm is at rank #14,326, tagged as anabbrev, pronounced [ˈhɪntɐm].

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 28187, this pair ranks #1,789,070 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of hintere vs hinterm

Shared letters: ehinrt. Private to "hintere": -. Private to "hinterm": m.

"hintere" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV  ·  "hinterm" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hinterehhintere · hinetre · hinntere · hinteer · hinterre · hintree · hinttere · hitnere
  • hintermhhinterm · hinetrm · hinnterm · hintemr · hintermm · hinterrm · hintrem · hintterm

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "hintere" and "hinterm" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "hintere" is an adjective and "hinterm" an abbrev, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "hintere" or "hinterm" show up more?
"hintere" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,861 in our German list, against #14,326 for "hinterm". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "hintere" and "hinterm" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hintere" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hinterm" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,789,070 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hintere" and "hinterm" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hinderte vs hintere". 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 #1,789,070 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