roadvsrundConfusable pair

Quick tell: road is a noun, rund is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#7,385
“road” frequency rank
#460
“rund” frequency rank
7845
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature road rund
Definition Straße kreisförmig (eben)

Where the eye mixes road and rund

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

4 ch
road
4 ch
rund

Why the eye confuses road with rund

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: road is [rəʊd] while rund is [ʁʊnt]. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7845, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

road is recorded at frequency rank #7,385, classified as anoun, pronounced [rəʊd]. rund is at rank #460, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ʁʊnt].

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 7845, this pair ranks #1,986,663 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of road vs rund

Shared letters: dr. Private to "road": ao. Private to "rund": nu.

"road" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "rund" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • roadorad · raod · roadd · roda · rroad
  • rundrnud · rrund · rudn · rundd · runnd · urnd

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "road" for "rund" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "road" is a noun and "rund" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "road" or "rund"?
"rund" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #460 in our German list, against #7,385 for "road". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "road" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "rund" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,986,663 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "road" and "rund" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "road vs RSA". 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 #1,986,663 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