WienvswohnConfusable pair

Quick tell: Wien is a name, wohn is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Wien” is a name and “wohn” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#563
“Wien” frequency rank
#7,257
“wohn” frequency rank
7820
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Wien wohn
Definition Hauptstadt Österreichs 2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs wohnen

Where the eye mixes Wien and wohn

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
Wien
4 ch
wohn

Why the eye confuses Wien with wohn

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Wien is [viːn] while wohn is [voːn]. 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 (name vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7820, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Wien is recorded at frequency rank #563, classified as aname, pronounced [viːn]. wohn is at rank #7,257, tagged as averb, pronounced [voːn].

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 7820, this pair ranks #1,986,772 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Wien vs wohn

Shared letters: nw. Private to "Wien": ei. Private to "wohn": ho.

"Wien" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "wohn" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Wieniwen · wienn · wwien
  • wohnowhn · whon · wohhn · wohnn · wonh · wwohn

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Wien" and "wohn" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Wien" is a name and "wohn" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Wien" vs "wohn" - which ranks higher?
"Wien" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #563 in our German list, against #7,257 for "wohn". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Wien" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wohn" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,986,772 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Wien" and "wohn" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wohn vs Wotan". 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 #1,986,772 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