WäldernvswundernWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Wäldern is a noun, wundern is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Wäldern” is a noun and “wundern” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#10,980
“Wäldern” frequency rank
#5,554
“wundern” frequency rank
16534
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Wäldern wundern
Definition Dativ Plural des Substantivs Wald etwas Unerwartetes erstaunt oder irritiert (verwundert) jemanden

Where the eye mixes Wäldern and wundern

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. Wäldern and wundern follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
Wäldern
7 ch
wundern

Look-alike desk: Wäldern vs wundern

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Wäldern is [ˈvɛldɐn] while wundern is [ˈvʊndɐn]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16534, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Wäldern is recorded at frequency rank #10,980, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈvɛldɐn]. wundern is at rank #5,554, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈvʊndɐn].

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 16534, this pair ranks #1,935,066 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Wäldern vs wundern

Shared letters: denrw. Private to "Wäldern": lä. Private to "wundern": u.

"Wäldern" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC  ·  "wundern" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wundern ← uwndern · wnudern · wudnern · wunddern · wundenr · wundernn · wunderrn · wundren

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Wäldern" for "wundern" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Wäldern" is a noun and "wundern" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "Wäldern" or "wundern" show up more?
"wundern" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,554 in our German list, against #10,980 for "Wäldern". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Wäldern" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wundern" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,935,066 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Wäldern" and "wundern" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wundern vs Würmern". 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 #1,935,066 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