legervsLügeWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: leger is a adjective, Lüge is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“leger” is an adjective and “Lüge” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#46,108
“leger” frequency rank
#4,372
“Lüge” frequency rank
50480
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature leger Lüge
Definition leicht, bequem (meist in Zusammenhang mit Kleidung) falsche Aussage, mit der andere bewusst getäuscht werden sollen

Where the eye mixes leger and Lüge

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. leger runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against Lüge's 4 (CVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
leger
4 ch
Lüge

Look-alike desk: leger vs Lüge

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: leger is [leˈʒɛːɐ̯] while Lüge is [ˈlyːɡə]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50480, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

leger is recorded at frequency rank #46,108, classified as anadj, pronounced [leˈʒɛːɐ̯]. Lüge is at rank #4,372, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈlyːɡə].

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 50480, this pair ranks #1,172,139 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of leger vs Lüge

Shared letters: egl. Private to "leger": r. Private to "Lüge": ü.

"leger" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "Lüge" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • leger ← elger · leegr · legerr · legger · legre · lgeer · lleger

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "leger" and "Lüge" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "leger" is an adjective and "Lüge" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "leger" or "Lüge"?
"Lüge" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,372 in our German list, against #46,108 for "leger". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "leger" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Lüge" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,172,139 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "leger" and "Lüge" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Lees vs leger". 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 #1,172,139 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