natürlichvsnatürlichesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#222
“natürlich” frequency rank
#17,372
“natürliches” frequency rank
17594
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature natürlich natürliches
Definition sich auf die Natur beziehend, naturgemäß, in der Natur vorkommend Nominativ Singular Neutrum der starken Deklination des Positivs des Adjektivs natürlich

Where the eye mixes natürlich and natürliches

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence. natürlich runs 9 letters (CVCVCCVCC) against natürliches's 11 (CVCVCCVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

9 ch
natürlich
11 ch
natürliches

Visual trap between natürlich and natürliches

A purely visual mix-up. natürlich ([naˈtyːɐ̯lɪç]) and natürliches ([naˈtyːɐ̯lɪçəs]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “natürlich” sits inside “natürliches”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17594, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

natürlich is recorded at frequency rank #222, classified as anadj, pronounced [naˈtyːɐ̯lɪç]. natürliches is at rank #17,372, tagged as anadj, pronounced [naˈtyːɐ̯lɪçəs].

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 17594, this pair ranks #1,926,000 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of natürlich vs natürliches

Shared letters: achilnrtü. Private to "natürlich": -. Private to "natürliches": es.

"natürlich" · 9 letters · shape CVCVCCVCC  ·  "natürliches" · 11 letters · shape CVCVCCVCCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "natürlich" and "natürliches" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently ([naˈtyːɐ̯lɪç] versus [naˈtyːɐ̯lɪçəs]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary German text, does "natürlich" or "natürliches" show up more?
"natürlich" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #222 in our German list, against #17,372 for "natürliches". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "natürlich" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "natürliches" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,926,000 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "natürlich" and "natürliches" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "natürlichem vs natürliches". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #1,926,000 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