wagevswarsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#11,358
“wage” frequency rank
#3,861
“wars” frequency rank
15219
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wage wars
Definition 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs wagen 3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs war

Letter map: wage vs wars

Shared letters muted; letters that set wage and wars apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
wage
4 ch
wars

Corpus notes: wage and wars

wage and wars are indexed as a confusable German pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 15219, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wage is recorded at frequency rank #11,358, classified as averb, pronounced [ˈvaːɡə]. wars is at rank #3,861, tagged as averb, pronounced […].

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 15219, this pair ranks #1,945,510 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of wage vs wars

Shared letters: aw. Private to "wage": eg. Private to "wars": rs.

"wage" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "wars" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wageawge · waeg · wagge · wgae · wwage
  • warsawrs · warrs · warss · wasr · wras · wwars

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "wage" and "wars" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "wage" vs "wars" - which ranks higher?
"wars" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,861 in our German list, against #11,358 for "wage". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pair "wage" vs "wars" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "wage" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wars" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,945,510 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "wage" and "wars" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wage vs waste". 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 #1,945,510 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