SehervsseinerWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Seher is a noun, seiner is an unknown, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Seher” is a noun and “seiner” is an unknown - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#39,624
“Seher” frequency rank
#142
“seiner” frequency rank
39766
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Seher seiner
Definition jemand, der sich etwas ansieht Genitiv des Personalpronomens er

Where the eye mixes Seher and seiner

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. Seher runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against seiner's 6 (CVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
Seher
6 ch
seiner

Visual trap between Seher and seiner

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Seher is [ˈzeːɐ] while seiner is [ˈzaɪ̯nɐ]. 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 unknown), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39766, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Seher is recorded at frequency rank #39,624, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈzeːɐ]. seiner is at rank #142, tagged as anunknown, pronounced [ˈzaɪ̯nɐ].

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 39766, this pair ranks #1,527,505 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Seher vs seiner

Shared letters: ers. Private to "Seher": h. Private to "seiner": in.

"Seher" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "seiner" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Seher ← esher · seehr · seherr · sehher · sehre · sheer · sseher
  • seiner ← esiner · seienr · seinerr · seinner · seinre · senier · siener · sseiner

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Seher" and "seiner" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Seher" is a noun and "seiner" an unknown, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Seher" or "seiner"?
"seiner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #142 in our German list, against #39,624 for "Seher". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Seher" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "seiner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,527,505 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Seher" and "seiner" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Seher vs steter". 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 #1,527,505 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