kau vs ku, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“kau” is a verb and “ku” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#41,934
“kau” frequency rank: #17,061
“ku” frequency rank: 58995
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	kau	ku
Definition	2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs kauen	wo

Letter map: kau vs ku

Shared letters muted; letters that set kau and ku apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch

kau

2 ch

Role in the sentence - kau and ku

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: kau is averb and kuapronoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58995, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

kau is recorded at frequency rank #41,934, classified as averb, pronounced [kaʊ̯]. ku is at rank #17,061, 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 58995, this pair ranks #841,311 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of kau vs ku

Shared letters: ku. Private to "kau": a. Private to "ku": -.

"kau" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "ku" · 2 letters · shape CV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "kau" for "ku" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "kau" is a verb and "ku" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "kau" or "ku"?

"ku" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,061 in our German list, against #41,934 for "kau". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "kau" and "ku". Here's where to go from here.

Full dictionary entry for "kau" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "ku" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #841,311 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"kau" and "ku" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "kau vs KGaA". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #841,311 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.