seidvssieWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#843
“seid” frequency rank
#18
“sie” frequency rank
861
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature seid sie
Definition [1] 2. Person Plural Präsens Indikativ des Verbs sein 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 seid and sie

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

4 ch
seid
3 ch
sie

Visual trap between seid and sie

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: seid is [zaɪ̯t] 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 (verb vs pronoun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 861, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

seid is recorded at frequency rank #843, classified as averb, pronounced [zaɪ̯t]. 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 861, this pair ranks #2,005,243 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of seid vs sie

Shared letters: eis. Private to "seid": d. Private to "sie": -.

"seid" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "sie" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • seidesid · sedi · seidd · sied · sseid

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "seid" and "sie" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "seid" is a verb and "sie" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "seid" vs "sie" - which ranks higher?
"sie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18 in our German list, against #843 for "seid". 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 "seid" 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 #2,005,243 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "seid" and "sie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "seg vs seid". 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 #2,005,243 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