WundenvswütenWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#7,135
“Wunden” frequency rank
#42,274
“wüten” frequency rank
49409
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Wunden wüten
Definition Nominativ Plural des Substantivs Wunde kraftvoll agierend und oft ungerichtet Zerstörungen anrichten

Where the eye mixes Wunden and wüten

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Wunden runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against wüten's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
Wunden
5 ch
wüten

Visual trap between Wunden and wüten

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Wunden is [ˈvʊndn̩] while wüten is [ˈvyːtn̩]. 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 (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49409, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Wunden is recorded at frequency rank #7,135, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈvʊndn̩]. wüten is at rank #42,274, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈvyːtn̩].

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 49409, this pair ranks #1,212,644 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Wunden vs wüten

Shared letters: enw. Private to "Wunden": du. Private to "wüten": .

"Wunden" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "wüten" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Wundenuwnden · wnuden · wudnen · wundden · wundenn · wundne · wunedn · wunnden

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Wunden" for "wüten" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Wunden" is a noun and "wüten" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Wunden" or "wüten"?
"Wunden" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,135 in our German list, against #42,274 for "wüten". 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 "Wunden" and "wüten" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Wunden" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wüten" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,212,644 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Wunden" and "wüten" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Wotan vs wüten". 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 #1,212,644 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