Rätsel
German, noun
Rätsel is spelled R-Ä-T-S-E-L (6 letters) and appears 15 times per million words in written German, the 5,079th most frequent German word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Rätsel is a German neuter noun meaning “riddle, puzzle, mystery, enigma” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). In lower case, rätsel is a different word: “first-person singular present”. The German Wiktionary defines it as “Aufgabe, in Form einer Frage oder auch in graphischer Form, die durch Raten und Nachdenken zu lösen ist”.
What does Rätsel mean in English?
noun
- 1
neuterriddle, puzzle, mystery, enigma
verb
- 1
first-person singular present
- 2
singular imperative
Source: English Wiktionary, German section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How German dictionaries define it
noun: 1. Aufgabe, in Form einer Frage oder auch in graphischer Form, die durch Raten und Nachdenken zu lösen ist 2. ungelöste Fragestellung, ein Mysterium
The definition in the German Wiktionary, in German.
Source: German Wiktionary, dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of Rätsel
- Rätsels genitive
- Rätseln dative definite plural
- Räthsel alternative obsolete
- Rätzel alternative obsolete
Source: English Wiktionary and German Wiktionary (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
English words that translate to Rätsel
Source: the translation tables of the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026.
How common is Rätsel in German?
Rätsel appears 15 times per million words in written German.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).