Which to use
“roten” is an adjective and “ruhen” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,677
- “roten” frequency rank
- #8,268
- “ruhen” frequency rank
- 9945
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | roten | ruhen |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Genitiv Singular Maskulinum der starken Flexion des Adjektivs rot | sich erholen, eine Pause machen |
Where the eye mixes roten and ruhen
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. roten and ruhen follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: roten vs ruhen
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: roten is [ˈʁoːtn̩] while ruhen is [ˈʁuːən]. 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 verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 9945, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
roten is recorded at frequency rank #1,677, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈʁoːtn̩]. ruhen is at rank #8,268, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈʁuːən].
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 9945, this pair ranks #1,977,525 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of roten vs ruhen
Shared letters: enr. Private to "roten": ot. Private to "ruhen": hu.
"roten" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "ruhen" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "roten" for "ruhen" ever safe?
Which is more common, "roten" or "ruhen"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "roten" and "ruhen" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "roten" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "ruhen" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #1,977,525 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "roten" and "ruhen" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ruhen vs rühmen". 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 #1,977,525 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.