ihn vs io, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#140
“ihn” frequency rank: #26,465
“io” frequency rank: 26605
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	ihn	io
Definition	Personalpronomen 3. Person Maskulinum Singular Akkusativ	Für die 1. Person Singular Nominativ/Subjektfall – im Objektfall: siehe me

Letter map: ihn vs io

Shared letters muted; letters that set ihn and io apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch

ihn

2 ch

Pair insight - ihn / io

ihn and io are indexed as a confusable German pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26605, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ihn is recorded at frequency rank #140, classified as apron, pronounced [iːn]. io is at rank #26,465, tagged as apron, pronounced […].

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 26605, this pair ranks #1,815,466 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ihn vs io

Shared letters: i. Private to "ihn": hn. Private to "io": o.

"ihn" · 3 letters · shape VCC · "io" · 2 letters · shape VV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ihn" and "io" be used interchangeably?

No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.

Frequency check: "ihn" vs "io" - which ranks higher?

"ihn" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #140 in our German list, against #26,465 for "io". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

You've compared "ihn" and "io". Here's where to go from here.

Full dictionary entry for "ihn" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "io" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #1,815,466 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"ihn" and "io" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "io vs puzzles". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #1,815,466 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.