FBI
[ɛfbiːˈʔaɪ̯]
The verdict
“FBI” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #9,189) as an abbreviation. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #9,189
- frequency rank, German
- 3,474
- “F” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Federal Bureau of Investigation, die Ermittlungsbehörde der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika
Corpus desk
Index DE-fbi · FBI · German
FBI · rank #9,189 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-COMMON #9,189
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,474
- PHOTO-FINISH fasziniert
Nearest frequency peer: fasziniert (-1 rank slots)
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Häufigkeitsnachbarn des Verwechslers „FBI“
Peers mit ähnlichem Corpus-Gewicht, getrennt von den Verwechslungspaaren unten
- farm
farm
90,815 corpus weight
- faszinierend
faszinierend
90,814 corpus weight
- fasziniert
fasziniert
90,813 corpus weight
- FBI
FBI
90,812 corpus weight
- fischen
fischen
90,811 corpus weight
- Fluch
Fluch
90,809 corpus weight
What this shows Balken platzieren „FBI“ gegen die nächsten gerankten deutschen Lemmata, kein Reprint der Verwechslungsdesk.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | FBI |
| Language | German |
| Part of speech | Abbreviation |
| IPA | [ɛfbiːˈʔaɪ̯] |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #9,189 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Corpus-Rang neben Verwechslern von „FBI“
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for FBI is neighbouring look-alikes ("FC", "fi", …), not just typos; it is anabbreviation pronounced [ɛfbiːˈʔaɪ̯]. Frequency #9,189 among 3,474 “F” headwords. Gloss: "Federal Bureau of Investigation, die Ermittlungsbehörde der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika".
FBI doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "FC", "fi", "FH", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct German form is FBI, spelled F-B-I.
Definition
- 1Federal Bureau of Investigation, die Ermittlungsbehörde der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how FBI appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Sein Nachbar wird vom FBI beobachtet.
„Das FBI ermittelt gegen drei ehemalige enge Trump-Mitarbeiter: Paul Manafort, Trumps Ex-Kampagnen-Chef, der jahrelang den ukrainischen Präsidenten Janukowitsch beriet und zwölf Millionen Dollar Schmiergelt kassiert haben soll.“
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 German corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "FBI"?
What does "FBI" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "FBI"?
How do you pronounce "FBI"?
What language does "FBI" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Similar German words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "FBI", not the corpus desk frequency band.