Lu vs lui, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“Lu” is an abbrev and “lui” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,892
“Lu” frequency rank: #44,056
“lui” frequency rank: 57948
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	Lu	lui
Definition	Lutetium	er

Letter map: Lu vs lui

Shared letters muted; letters that set Lu and lui apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

2 ch

3 ch

lui

Role in the sentence - Lu and lui

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Lu is anabbrev and luiapronoun. On the page they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “Lu” sits inside “lui”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57948, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Lu is recorded at frequency rank #13,892, classified as anabbrev. lui is at rank #44,056, tagged as apron, pronounced [lɥi].

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 57948, this pair ranks #881,575 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Lu vs lui

Shared letters: lu. Private to "Lu": -. Private to "lui": i.

"Lu" · 2 letters · shape CV · "lui" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Lu" and "lui" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Lu" is an abbrev and "lui" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary German text, does "Lu" or "lui" show up more?

"Lu" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,892 in our German list, against #44,056 for "lui". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "Lu" and "lui".

Full dictionary entry for "Lu" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "lui" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #881,575 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"Lu" and "lui" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Lori vs lui". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #881,575 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.