wählenvswarmenWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: wählen is a verb, warmen is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“wählen” is a verb and “warmen” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#984
“wählen” frequency rank
#6,879
“warmen” frequency rank
7863
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wählen warmen
Definition sich für eine von mehreren Möglichkeiten entscheiden Genitiv Singular Maskulinum der starken Flexion des Adjektivs warm

Where the eye mixes wählen and warmen

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

6 ch
wählen
6 ch
warmen

Look-alike desk: wählen vs warmen

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: wählen is [ˈvɛːlən] while warmen is [ˈvaʁmən]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7863, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wählen is recorded at frequency rank #984, classified as averb, pronounced [ˈvɛːlən]. warmen is at rank #6,879, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈvaʁmən].

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 7863, this pair ranks #1,986,588 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of wählen vs warmen

Shared letters: enw. Private to "wählen": hlä. Private to "warmen": amr.

"wählen" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "warmen" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • warmenawrmen · wamren · waremn · warmenn · warmmen · warmne · warrmen · wramen

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "wählen" and "warmen" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "wählen" is a verb and "warmen" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "wählen" or "warmen" show up more?
"wählen" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #984 in our German list, against #6,879 for "warmen". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "wählen" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "warmen" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,986,588 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "wählen" and "warmen" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "warmen vs warnten". 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 #1,986,588 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