plantsvstumTell them apart

Quick tell: plants is a noun, tum is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“plants” is a noun and “tum” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,962
“plants” frequency rank
#29,375
“tum” frequency rank
79337
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature plants tum
Definition Plural des Substantivs plant dann, alsdann

Letter map: plants vs tum

Shared letters muted; letters that set plants and tum apart highlighted. Shared run: 1. plants runs 6 letters (CCVCCC) against tum's 3 (CVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
plants
3 ch
tum

Grammar separator: plants vs tum

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: plants is anoun and tumanadverb. On the page they differ by 3 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 79337, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

plants is recorded at frequency rank #49,962, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. tum is at rank #29,375, tagged as anadv, 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 79337, this pair ranks #218,614 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of plants vs tum

Shared letters: t. Private to "plants": alnps. Private to "tum": mu.

"plants" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCC  ·  "tum" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • plants ← lpants · palnts · plannts · plantss · plantts · platns · pllants · plnats

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "plants" for "tum" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "plants" is a noun and "tum" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "plants" or "tum"?
"tum" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #29,375 in our German list, against #49,962 for "plants". 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 "plants" and "tum".

  • Full dictionary entry for "plants" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tum" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #218,614 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "plants" and "tum" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "plants 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 #218,614 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