wohlervswühlenWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: wohler is a adjective, wühlen is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#25,844
“wohler” frequency rank
#30,397
“wühlen” frequency rank
56241
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wohler wühlen
Definition Nominativ Singular Maskulinum der starken Deklination des Positivs des Adjektivs wohl meist mit technischen Hilfsmitteln im Erdboden graben

Where the eye mixes wohler and wühlen

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. wohler and wühlen follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
wohler
6 ch
wühlen

Visual trap between wohler and wühlen

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: wohler is [ˈvoːlɐ] while wühlen is [ˈvyːlən]. 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 (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56241, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wohler is recorded at frequency rank #25,844, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈvoːlɐ]. wühlen is at rank #30,397, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈvyːlən].

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 56241, this pair ranks #947,858 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of wohler vs wühlen

Shared letters: ehlw. Private to "wohler": or. Private to "wühlen": nü.

"wohler" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "wühlen" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wohler ← owhler · wholer · wohelr · wohhler · wohlerr · wohller · wohlre · wolher

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "wohler" and "wühlen" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "wohler" is an adjective and "wühlen" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "wohler" or "wühlen"?
"wohler" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #25,844 in our German list, against #30,397 for "wühlen". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "wohler" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wühlen" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #947,858 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "wohler" and "wühlen" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "weilen vs wühlen". 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 #947,858 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