KöllevstimerTell them apart

Quick tell: Kölle is a name, timer is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Kölle” is a name and “timer” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,855
“Kölle” frequency rank
#31,301
“timer” frequency rank
81156
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Kölle timer
Definition deutscher Nachname, Familienname Gerät, das elektrische Geräte zu einstellbaren Zeiten ein- und ausschaltet

Letter map: Kölle vs timer

Shared letters muted; letters that set Kölle and timer apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

5 ch
Kölle
5 ch
timer

Part-of-speech tell for Kölle / timer

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Kölle is aname and timeranoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 5 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 81156, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Kölle is recorded at frequency rank #49,855, classified as aname, pronounced […]. timer is at rank #31,301, tagged as anoun, 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 81156, this pair ranks #181,174 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Kölle vs timer

Shared letters: e. Private to "Kölle": klö. Private to "timer": imrt.

"Kölle" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "timer" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • timeritmer · tiemr · timerr · timmer · timre · tmier · ttimer

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Kölle" for "timer" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Kölle" is a name and "timer" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Kölle" or "timer" show up more?
"timer" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,301 in our German list, against #49,855 for "Kölle". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "Kölle" vs "timer" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Kölle" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "timer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #181,174 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Kölle" and "timer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Kölle vs puzzles". 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 #181,174 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