nicvsnimmWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: nic is a pronoun, nimm is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“nic” is a pronoun and “nimm” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#33,733
“nic” frequency rank
#2,916
“nimm” frequency rank
36649
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature nic nimm
Definition nichts 2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs nehmen

Where the eye mixes nic and nimm

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. nic runs 3 letters (CVC) against nimm's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
nic
4 ch
nimm

Visual trap between nic and nimm

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: nic is [ɲit͡s] while nimm is [nɪm]. 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 (pronoun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36649, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

nic is recorded at frequency rank #33,733, classified as apron, pronounced [ɲit͡s]. nimm is at rank #2,916, tagged as averb, pronounced [nɪm].

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 36649, this pair ranks #1,610,159 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of nic vs nimm

Shared letters: in. Private to "nic": c. Private to "nimm": m.

"nic" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "nimm" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • nimm ← inmm · nim · nmim · nnimm

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "nic" for "nimm" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "nic" is a pronoun and "nimm" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "nic" vs "nimm" - which ranks higher?
"nimm" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,916 in our German list, against #33,733 for "nic". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "nic" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "nimm" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,610,159 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "nic" and "nimm" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nic vs nox". 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 #1,610,159 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