SakevssieConfusable pair

Quick tell: Sake is a noun, sie is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Sake” is a noun and “sie” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#47,710
“Sake” frequency rank
#18
“sie” frequency rank
47728
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Sake sie
Definition japanisches alkoholisches Getränk, das aus mit Hefe vergorenem Reis hergestellt wird und heiß getrunken wird Personalpronomen 3. Person Femininum Singular, welches eine zuvor benutzte Nominalphrase im Femininum (Person, Tier, Sache oder Abstraktum) ersetzt oder bei fehlendem oder weit entferntem Bezugswort auf eine Person weiblichen natürlichen Geschlechts verweist

Where the eye mixes Sake and sie

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

4 ch
Sake
3 ch
sie

Look-alike desk: Sake vs sie

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Sake is [ˈzaːkə] while sie is [ziː]. 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 pronoun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47728, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Sake is recorded at frequency rank #47,710, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈzaːkə]. sie is at rank #18, tagged as apron, pronounced [ziː].

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 47728, this pair ranks #1,274,172 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Sake vs sie

Shared letters: es. Private to "Sake": ak. Private to "sie": i.

"Sake" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "sie" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Sakeaske · saek · sakke · skae · ssake

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Sake" and "sie" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Sake" is a noun and "sie" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Sake" vs "sie" - which ranks higher?
"sie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18 in our German list, against #47,710 for "Sake". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Sake" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sie" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,274,172 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Sake" and "sie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Sake vs Sire". 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 #1,274,172 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