wedervswideTell them apart

Quick tell: weder is a conjunction, wide is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#898
“weder” frequency rank
#20,128
“wide” frequency rank
21026
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature weder wide
Definition Das Wort „weder“ verneint die ihm folgende Aussage und kündigt mindestens eine weitere Verneinung an. von großer Ausdehnung

Where the eye mixes weder and wide

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

5 ch
weder
4 ch
wide

Why the eye confuses weder with wide

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: weder is [ˈveːdɐ] while wide is [waɪd]. 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 (conjunction vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 21026, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

weder is recorded at frequency rank #898, classified as aconj, pronounced [ˈveːdɐ]. wide is at rank #20,128, tagged as anadj, pronounced [waɪd].

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 21026, this pair ranks #1,891,006 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of weder vs wide

Shared letters: dew. Private to "weder": r. Private to "wide": i.

"weder" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "wide" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wederewder · wdeer · wedder · wederr · weedr · wweder
  • wideiwde · wdie · widde · wwide

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "weder" for "wide" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "weder" is a conjunction and "wide" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "weder" vs "wide" - which ranks higher?
"weder" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #898 in our German list, against #20,128 for "wide". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "weder" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wide" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,891,006 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "weder" and "wide" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wide vs wig". 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 #1,891,006 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