tai vs tätig, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“tai” is a conjunction and “tätig” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#22,530
“tai” frequency rank: #2,181
“tätig” frequency rank: 24711
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	tai	tätig
Definition	inklusives oder	handelnd, etwas Praktisches tuend

Letter map: tai vs tätig

Shared letters muted; letters that set tai and tätig apart highlighted. Shared run: 2. tai runs 3 letters (CVV) against tätig's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch

tai

5 ch

tätig

Grammar separator: tai vs tätig

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: tai is aconjunction and tätiganadjective. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24711, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tai is recorded at frequency rank #22,530, classified as aconj, pronounced […]. tätig is at rank #2,181, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈtɛːtɪç].

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 24711, this pair ranks #1,843,820 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tai vs tätig

Shared letters: it. Private to "tai": a. Private to "tätig": gä.

"tai" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "tätig" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "tai" and "tätig" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tai" is a conjunction and "tätig" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary German text, does "tai" or "tätig" show up more?

"tätig" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,181 in our German list, against #22,530 for "tai". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pair "tai" vs "tätig" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

Full dictionary entry for "tai" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "tätig" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #1,843,820 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"tai" and "tätig" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "puzzles vs tai". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #1,843,820 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.