IconvsIkoneTell them apart

Which to use

“Icon” and “Ikone” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#23,993
“Icon” frequency rank
#20,623
“Ikone” frequency rank
44616
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Icon Ikone
Definition kleine Grafik für Programme oder Hyperlinks Kultbild der orthodoxen Kirchen des byzantinischen Ritus

Where the eye mixes Icon and Ikone

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

4 ch
Icon
5 ch
Ikone

Look-alike desk: Icon vs Ikone

A purely visual mix-up. Icon ([ˈaɪ̯kn̩]) and Ikone ([iˈkoːnə]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44616, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Icon is recorded at frequency rank #23,993, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈaɪ̯kn̩]. Ikone is at rank #20,623, tagged as anoun, pronounced [iˈkoːnə].

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 44616, this pair ranks #1,380,401 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Icon vs Ikone

Shared letters: ino. Private to "Icon": c. Private to "Ikone": ek.

"Icon" · 4 letters · shape VCVC  ·  "Ikone" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Iconcion · iccon · icno · iconn · iocn
  • Ikoneikkone · iknoe · ikoen · ikonne · iokne · kione

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Icon" for "Ikone" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([ˈaɪ̯kn̩] versus [iˈkoːnə]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary German text, does "Icon" or "Ikone" show up more?
"Ikone" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,623 in our German list, against #23,993 for "Icon". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Icon" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Ikone" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,380,401 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Icon" and "Ikone" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Icon vs ICQ". 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 #1,380,401 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