rulesvssharingTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#28,370
“rules” frequency rank
#21,768
“sharing” frequency rank
50138
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature rules sharing
Definition Plural des Substantivs rule Partizip Präsens (present participle) des Verbs share

Letter map: rules vs sharing

Shared letters muted; letters that set rules and sharing apart highlighted. Shared run: 1. rules runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against sharing's 7 (CCVCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
rules
7 ch
sharing

Grammar separator: rules vs sharing

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: rules is anoun and sharingaverb. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50138, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

rules is recorded at frequency rank #28,370, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. sharing is at rank #21,768, tagged as averb, pronounced […].

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 50138, this pair ranks #1,185,192 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of rules vs sharing

Shared letters: rs. Private to "rules": elu. Private to "sharing": aghin.

"rules" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "sharing" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • rulesrlues · rrules · ruels · ruless · rulles · rulse · urles
  • sharinghsaring · sahring · shairng · sharign · sharingg · sharinng · sharnig · sharring

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "rules" for "sharing" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "rules" is a noun and "sharing" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "rules" or "sharing"?
"sharing" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #21,768 in our German list, against #28,370 for "rules". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "rules" and "sharing". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "rules" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sharing" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,185,192 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "rules" and "sharing" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "puzzles vs rules". 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 #1,185,192 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