SternvsstoryTell them apart

Which to use

“Stern” and “story” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#2,617
“Stern” frequency rank
#2,519
“story” frequency rank
5136
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Stern story
Definition massereiche, selbst leuchtende Gaskugel, Himmelskörper Geschichte, Erzählung, Handlung, Fabel

Where the eye mixes Stern and story

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
Stern
5 ch
story

Visual trap between Stern and story

A purely visual mix-up. Stern ([ʃtɛʁn]) and story ([stɔːri]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5136, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Stern is recorded at frequency rank #2,617, classified as anoun, pronounced [ʃtɛʁn]. story is at rank #2,519, tagged as anoun, pronounced [stɔːri].

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 5136, this pair ranks #1,995,683 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Stern vs story

Shared letters: rst. Private to "Stern": en. Private to "story": oy.

"Stern" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "story" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Sternsetrn · sstern · stenr · sternn · sterrn · stren · sttern · tsern
  • storysotry · sstory · storry · storyy · stoyr · stroy · sttory · tsory

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Stern" and "story" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently ([ʃtɛʁn] versus [stɔːri]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "Stern" vs "story" - which ranks higher?
"story" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,519 in our German list, against #2,617 for "Stern". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Stern" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "story" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,995,683 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Stern" and "story" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "storia vs story". 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 #1,995,683 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