ist
[ɪst]
The verdict
“ist” is in the everyday core of German, ranked #7 in German word frequency and used as a verb.
- #7
- frequency rank, German
- 3
- letters
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - 3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens des Verbs sein
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 | ist |
| Language | German |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | [ɪst] |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #7 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “ist” sits in German frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The German entry for ist is 3 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as [ɪst]. Corpus data places it at rank #7 in overall German word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens des Verbs sein".
Zero misspellings are on record for ist in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "IT", "ix", "its", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct German form is ist, spelled I-S-T.
Definition
- 13. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens des Verbs sein
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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Using “ist”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct German spelling is I-S-T - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as [ɪst] (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “IT” - see the side-by-side comparison. ist vs IT
- Browse more German words and confusable pairs in the same reference. German words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.