MühevsMuteTell them apart

Which to use

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

#2,352
“Mühe” frequency rank
#40,098
“Mute” frequency rank
42450
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Mühe Mute
Definition körperliche oder geistige Anstrengung Variante für den Dativ Singular des Substantivs Mut

Where the eye mixes Mühe and Mute

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. Mühe and Mute follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
Mühe
4 ch
Mute

Look-alike desk: Mühe vs Mute

A purely visual mix-up. Mühe ([ˈmyːə]) and Mute ([ˈmuːtə]) 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 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 42450, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Mühe is recorded at frequency rank #2,352, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈmyːə]. Mute is at rank #40,098, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈmuːtə].

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 42450, this pair ranks #1,448,914 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Mühe vs Mute

Shared letters: em. Private to "Mühe": . Private to "Mute": tu.

"Mühe" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "Mute" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Mutemmute · mtue · muet · umte

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Mühe" and "Mute" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently ([ˈmyːə] versus [ˈmuːtə]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary German text, does "Mühe" or "Mute" show up more?
"Mühe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,352 in our German list, against #40,098 for "Mute". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Mühe" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Mute" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,448,914 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Mühe" and "Mute" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Matze vs Mute". 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 #1,448,914 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