RehvsriebWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Reh is a noun, rieb is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Reh” is a noun and “rieb” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#18,374
“Reh” frequency rank
#45,548
“rieb” frequency rank
63922
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Reh rieb
Definition im Wald lebender Wiederkäuer aus der Familie der Hirsche oder Cervidae 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präteritum Aktiv des Verbs reiben

Where the eye mixes Reh and rieb

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. Reh runs 3 letters (CVC) against rieb's 4 (CVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
Reh
4 ch
rieb

Look-alike desk: Reh vs rieb

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Reh is [ʁeː] while rieb is [ʁiːp]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63922, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Reh is recorded at frequency rank #18,374, classified as anoun, pronounced [ʁeː]. rieb is at rank #45,548, tagged as averb, pronounced [ʁiːp].

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 63922, this pair ranks #659,616 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Reh vs rieb

Shared letters: er. Private to "Reh": h. Private to "rieb": bi.

"Reh" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "rieb" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • rieb ← ireb · reib · ribe · riebb · rrieb

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Reh" and "rieb" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Reh" is a noun and "rieb" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Reh" or "rieb" show up more?
"Reh" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,374 in our German list, against #45,548 for "rieb". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Reh" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "rieb" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #659,616 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Reh" and "rieb" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rieb vs RUB". 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 #659,616 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