karavskargWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#21,657
“kara” frequency rank
#39,459
“karg” frequency rank
61116
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature kara karg
Definition lieb, wert, teuer, wertvoll, hold, herzig (sehr) knapp, gering, wenig

Letter map: kara vs karg

Shared letters muted; letters that set kara and karg apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. kara (CVCV) and karg (CVCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

4 ch
kara
4 ch
karg

Spelling & dictionary notes on kara vs karg

kara and karg 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 a single letter - a in “kara” becomes g in “karg”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 61116, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

kara is recorded at frequency rank #21,657, classified as anadj. karg is at rank #39,459, tagged as anadj, pronounced [kaʁk].

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 61116, this pair ranks #761,718 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of kara vs karg

Shared letters: akr. Private to "kara": -. Private to "karg": g.

"kara" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "karg" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • kara ← akra · kaar · karra · kkara · kraa
  • karg ← akrg · kagr · kargg · karrg · kkarg · krag

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "kara" and "karg" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They differ by a single letter - a in “kara” becomes g in “karg”, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
In ordinary German text, does "kara" or "karg" show up more?
"kara" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #21,657 in our German list, against #39,459 for "karg". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "kara" and "karg".

  • Full dictionary entry for "kara" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "karg" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #761,718 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "kara" and "karg" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "karg vs karge". 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 #761,718 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