horchen
[ˈhɔʁçn̩]
The verdict
“horchen” is uncommon German (frequency #74,717 among 3,372 “H” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #74,717
- frequency rank, German
- 3,372
- “H” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - heimlich bei etwas zuhören
Corpus desk
Index DE-horchen · horchen · German
horchen · rank #74,717 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #74,717
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,372
- PHOTO-FINISH Honigbiene
Nearest frequency peer: Honigbiene (-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.
Langschwanz-Ränge nahe „horchen“
Dünnes Band: Balken invertieren den Rang, seltenere Formen wirken kürzer
- Holzbrücke
Holzbrücke
25,289 corpus weight
- Holzrahmen
Holzrahmen
25,287 corpus weight
- honest
honest
25,286 corpus weight
- Honigbiene
Honigbiene
25,285 corpus weight
- horchen
horchen
25,284 corpus weight
- Hypothalamus
Hypothalamus
25,281 corpus weight
What this shows Langschwanz-Sicht: wo „horchen“ gegen ähnlich seltene deutsche Ränge sitzt.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | horchen |
| Language | German |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | [ˈhɔʁçn̩] |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #74,717 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Langschwanz-Rang von „horchen“ im Deutschen
Rare enough to double-check
horchen is uncommon German at frequency #74,717 among 3,372 “H” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed [ˈhɔʁçn̩]. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for horchen, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
No documented word history exists for this headword, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct German form is horchen, spelled H-O-R-C-H-E-N.
Definition
- 1heimlich bei etwas zuhören
- 2sehr aufmerksam (angestrengt) auf bestimmte Geräusche achten
- 3auf jemanden/etwas hören
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how horchen appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Ich horche angestrengt in die Stille der Nacht, aber vernehme keinen einzigen Laut.
Sie horchte an der Tür ihrer Schwester.
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
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Similar German words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "horchen", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked German headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).