reinevsRheineWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: reine is a adjective, Rheine is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“reine” is an adjective and “Rheine” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,068
“reine” frequency rank
#20,385
“Rheine” frequency rank
23453
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature reine Rheine
Definition Nominativ Singular Femininum der starken Deklination des Positivs des Adjektivs rein eine Stadt in Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland

Same sound, different letters: reine vs Rheine

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. reine runs 5 letters (CVVCV) against Rheine's 6 (CCVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
reine
6 ch
Rheine

Ear matches; page differs - reine and Rheine

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: reine and Rheine carry the same recorded pronunciation, [ˈʁaɪ̯nə]. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other aname, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23453, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

reine is recorded at frequency rank #3,068, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈʁaɪ̯nə]. Rheine is at rank #20,385, tagged as aname, pronounced [ˈʁaɪ̯nə].

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 23453, this pair ranks #1,861,138 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of reine vs Rheine

Shared letters: einr. Private to "reine": -. Private to "Rheine": h.

"reine" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV  ·  "Rheine" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • reine ← erine · reien · reinne · renie · riene · rreine
  • Rheine ← hreine · rehine · rheien · rheinne · rhenie · rhheine · rhiene · rrheine

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "reine" and "Rheine" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "reine" is an adjective and "Rheine" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "reine" or "Rheine" show up more?
"reine" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,068 in our German list, against #20,385 for "Rheine". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "reine" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Rheine" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,861,138 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "reine" and "Rheine" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "reibe vs Rheine". 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 #1,861,138 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