openingvsThompsonConfusable pair

Quick tell: opening is a verb, Thompson is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“opening” is a verb and “Thompson” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#30,228
“opening” frequency rank
#13,250
“Thompson” frequency rank
43478
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature opening Thompson
Definition Partizip Präsens (present participle) des Verbs open Familienname, Nachname

Letter map: opening vs Thompson

Shared letters muted; letters that set opening and Thompson apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. opening runs 7 letters (VCVCVCC) against Thompson's 8 (CCVCCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
opening
8 ch
Thompson

Role in the sentence - opening and Thompson

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: opening is averb and Thompsonaname. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43478, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

opening is recorded at frequency rank #30,228, classified as averb, pronounced […]. Thompson is at rank #13,250, tagged as aname, pronounced […].

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 43478, this pair ranks #1,416,804 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of opening vs Thompson

Shared letters: nop. Private to "opening": egi. Private to "Thompson": hmst.

"opening" · 7 letters · shape VCVCVCC  ·  "Thompson" · 8 letters · shape CCVCCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • openingoepning · opeinng · openign · openingg · openinng · opennig · openning · opneing
  • Thompsonhtompson · thhompson · thmopson · thommpson · thomposn · thomppson · thompsno · thompsonn

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "opening" for "Thompson" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "opening" is a verb and "Thompson" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "opening" or "Thompson"?
"Thompson" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,250 in our German list, against #30,228 for "opening". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "opening" and "Thompson".

  • Full dictionary entry for "opening" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Thompson" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,416,804 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "opening" and "Thompson" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "opening vs puzzles". 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 #1,416,804 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