ohnevsotteConfusable pair

Quick tell: ohne is a preposition, otte is a num, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“ohne” is a preposition and “otte” is a num - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#111
“ohne” frequency rank
#38,325
“otte” frequency rank
38436
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ohne otte
Definition etwas oder jemanden ausschließend acht

Where the eye mixes ohne and otte

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

4 ch
ohne
4 ch
otte

Look-alike desk: ohne vs otte

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ohne is [ˈoːnə] while otte is [ˈo̜ːdə]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (preposition vs num), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38436, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ohne is recorded at frequency rank #111, classified as aprep, pronounced [ˈoːnə]. otte is at rank #38,325, tagged as anum, pronounced [ˈo̜ːdə].

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 38436, this pair ranks #1,564,022 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ohne vs otte

Shared letters: eo. Private to "ohne": hn. Private to "otte": t.

"ohne" · 4 letters · shape VCCV  ·  "otte" · 4 letters · shape VCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • ohne ← hone · ohen · ohhne · ohnne · onhe
  • otte ← ote · otet

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ohne" and "otte" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ohne" is a preposition and "otte" a num, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "ohne" or "otte" show up more?
"ohne" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #111 in our German list, against #38,325 for "otte". 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 "ohne" and "otte" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ohne" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "otte" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,564,022 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ohne" and "otte" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "otte vs Outs". 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 #1,564,022 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