pickvspiepWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: pick is a verb, piep is an intj, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“pick” is a verb and “piep” is an intj - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#14,895
“pick” frequency rank
#43,410
“piep” frequency rank
58305
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pick piep
Definition 2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs picken der Laut eines Pfeifens

Where the eye mixes pick and piep

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
pick
4 ch
piep

Visual trap between pick and piep

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pick is [pɪk] while piep is [piːp]. 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 (verb vs intj), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58305, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pick is recorded at frequency rank #14,895, classified as averb, pronounced [pɪk]. piep is at rank #43,410, tagged as anintj, pronounced [piːp].

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 58305, this pair ranks #867,962 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pick vs piep

Shared letters: ip. Private to "pick": ck. Private to "piep": e.

"pick" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "piep" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pickipck · pcik · picck · pickk · pikc · ppick
  • piepipep · peip · piepp · ppiep

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "pick" and "piep" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pick" is a verb and "piep" an intj, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "pick" or "piep" show up more?
"pick" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,895 in our German list, against #43,410 for "piep". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "pick" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "piep" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #867,962 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pick" and "piep" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "piep vs pig". 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 #867,962 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