HofervshohenTell them apart

Quick tell: Hofer is a name, hohen is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Hofer” is a name and “hohen” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#7,932
“Hofer” frequency rank
#858
“hohen” frequency rank
8790
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Hofer hohen
Definition deutscher Nachname, Familienname Genitiv Singular Maskulinum der starken Flexion des Adjektivs hoch

Where the eye mixes Hofer and hohen

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Hofer and hohen follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
Hofer
5 ch
hohen

Why the eye confuses Hofer with hohen

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Hofer is [ˈhoːfɐ] while hohen is [ˈhoːən]. 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 (name vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8790, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Hofer is recorded at frequency rank #7,932, classified as aname, pronounced [ˈhoːfɐ]. hohen is at rank #858, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈhoːən].

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 8790, this pair ranks #1,982,829 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Hofer vs hohen

Shared letters: eho. Private to "Hofer": fr. Private to "hohen": n.

"Hofer" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "hohen" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Hoferhfoer · hhofer · hoefr · hoferr · hoffer · hofre · ohfer
  • hohenhhoen · hhohen · hoehn · hohenn · hohhen · hohne · ohhen

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Hofer" and "hohen" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Hofer" is a name and "hohen" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Hofer" or "hohen"?
"hohen" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #858 in our German list, against #7,932 for "Hofer". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Hofer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hohen" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,982,829 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Hofer" and "hohen" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Hemer vs Hofer". 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 #1,982,829 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