TaubenvstrübeWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: Tauben is a noun, trübe is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Tauben” is a noun and “trübe” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,763
“Tauben” frequency rank
#34,407
“trübe” frequency rank
46170
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Tauben trübe
Definition Nominativ Plural des Substantivs Taube Nominativ Singular Femininum der starken Deklination des Positivs des Adjektivs trüb

Where the eye mixes Tauben and trübe

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

6 ch
Tauben
5 ch
trübe

Visual trap between Tauben and trübe

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Tauben is [ˈtaʊ̯bn̩] while trübe is [ˈtʁyːbə]. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46170, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Tauben is recorded at frequency rank #11,763, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈtaʊ̯bn̩]. trübe is at rank #34,407, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈtʁyːbə].

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 46170, this pair ranks #1,328,188 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Tauben vs trübe

Shared letters: bet. Private to "Tauben": anu. Private to "trübe": .

"Tauben" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC  ·  "trübe" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Taubenatuben · tabuen · taubben · taubenn · taubne · tauebn · ttauben · tuaben

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Tauben" for "trübe" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Tauben" is a noun and "trübe" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Tauben" or "trübe" show up more?
"Tauben" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,763 in our German list, against #34,407 for "trübe". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Tauben" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "trübe" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,328,188 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Tauben" and "trübe" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "trübe vs trügen". 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 #1,328,188 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