regervsriverTell them apart

Quick tell: reger is a adjective, river is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“reger” is an adjective and “river” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#22,858
“reger” frequency rank
#9,616
“river” frequency rank
32474
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature reger river
Definition Nominativ Singular Maskulinum der starken Deklination des Positivs des Adjektivs rege Fluss

Where the eye mixes reger and river

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
reger
5 ch
river

Why the eye confuses reger with river

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: reger is [ˈʁeːɡɐ] while river is [ˈɹɪvə]. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 32474, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

reger is recorded at frequency rank #22,858, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈʁeːɡɐ]. river is at rank #9,616, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈɹɪvə].

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 32474, this pair ranks #1,706,813 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of reger vs river

Shared letters: er. Private to "reger": g. Private to "river": iv.

"reger" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "river" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • regererger · reegr · regerr · regger · regre · rgeer · rreger
  • riverirver · rievr · riverr · rivre · rivver · rriver · rvier

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "reger" and "river" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "reger" is an adjective and "river" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "reger" or "river"?
"river" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,616 in our German list, against #22,858 for "reger". 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 "reger" and "river" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "reger" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "river" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,706,813 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "reger" and "river" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "reger vs regst". 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 #1,706,813 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