LavslameTell them apart

Quick tell: La is a abbrev, lame is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“La” is an abbrev and “lame” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#817
“La” frequency rank
#49,857
“lame” frequency rank
50674
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature La lame
Definition Lanthan dünne Platte, dünne Schicht, Klinge

Letter map: La vs lame

Shared letters muted; letters that set La and lame apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

2 ch
La
4 ch
lame

Grammar separator: La vs lame

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: La is anabbrev and lameanoun. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “La” sits inside “lame”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50674, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

La is recorded at frequency rank #817, classified as anabbrev. lame is at rank #49,857, tagged as anoun, pronounced [lam].

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 50674, this pair ranks #1,164,799 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of La vs lame

Shared letters: al. Private to "La": -. Private to "lame": em.

"La" · 2 letters · shape CV  ·  "lame" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lamealme · laem · lamme · llame · lmae

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "La" and "lame" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "La" is an abbrev and "lame" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "La" or "lame" show up more?
"La" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #817 in our German list, against #49,857 for "lame". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "La" and "lame".

  • Full dictionary entry for "La" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lame" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,164,799 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "La" and "lame" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lähmt vs lame". 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 #1,164,799 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