LändervslinerWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“Länder” and “liner” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#45,155
“Länder” frequency rank
#28,631
“liner” frequency rank
73786
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Länder liner
Definition Variante orthographique de länder. Paquebot de ligne.

Where the eye mixes Länder and liner

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. Länder runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against liner's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
Länder
5 ch
liner

Look-alike desk: Länder vs liner

A purely visual mix-up. Länder (\lɛn.dœʁ\) and liner (\laj.nœʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 73786, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Länder is recorded at frequency rank #45,155, classified as anoun, pronounced \lɛn.dœʁ\. liner is at rank #28,631, tagged as anoun, pronounced \laj.nœʁ\.

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 73786, this pair ranks #39,245 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Länder vs liner

Shared letters: elnr. Private to "Länder": dä. Private to "liner": i.

"Länder" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "liner" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • liner ← ilner · lienr · linerr · linner · linre · lliner · lnier

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Länder" and "liner" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\lɛn.dœʁ\ versus \laj.nœʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "Länder" or "liner"?
"liner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #28,631 in our French list, against #45,155 for "Länder". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Länder" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "liner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #39,245 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Länder" and "liner" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lancet vs Länder". 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 #39,245 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list