kuckenvskürtenWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#49,848
“kucken” frequency rank
#39,491
“kürten” frequency rank
89339
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature kucken kürten
Definition seine Augen auf etwas richten 1. Person Plural Indikativ Präteritum Aktiv des Verbs küren

Where the eye mixes kucken and kürten

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. kucken and kürten follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
kucken
6 ch
kürten

Look-alike desk: kucken vs kürten

A purely visual mix-up. kucken ([ˈkʊkn̩]) and kürten ([ˈkyːɐ̯tn̩]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 89339, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

kucken is recorded at frequency rank #49,848, classified as averb, pronounced [ˈkʊkn̩]. kürten is at rank #39,491, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈkyːɐ̯tn̩].

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 89339, this pair ranks #58,410 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of kucken vs kürten

Shared letters: ekn. Private to "kucken": cu. Private to "kürten": rtü.

"kucken" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "kürten" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • kucken ← kcuken · kkucken · kuccken · kucekn · kuckenn · kuckken · kuckne · kukcen

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "kucken" for "kürten" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([ˈkʊkn̩] versus [ˈkyːɐ̯tn̩]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "kucken" vs "kürten" - which ranks higher?
"kürten" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #39,491 in our German list, against #49,848 for "kucken". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "kucken" and "kürten" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "kucken" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "kürten" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #58,410 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "kucken" and "kürten" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Kraken vs kucken". 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 #58,410 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