magvsmirWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: mag is a unknown, mir is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“mag” is an unknown and “mir” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#411
“mag” frequency rank
#62
“mir” frequency rank
473
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mag mir
Definition 1. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv von mögen Dativ der ersten Person Singular

Where the eye mixes mag and mir

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

3 ch
mag
3 ch
mir

Why the eye confuses mag with mir

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: mag is [maːk] while mir is [miːɐ̯]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (unknown vs pronoun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 473, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mag is recorded at frequency rank #411, classified as anunknown, pronounced [maːk]. mir is at rank #62, tagged as apron, pronounced [miːɐ̯].

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 473, this pair ranks #2,005,804 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of mag vs mir

Shared letters: m. Private to "mag": ag. Private to "mir": ir.

"mag" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "mir" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "mag" and "mir" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mag" is an unknown and "mir" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "mag" or "mir" show up more?
"mir" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #62 in our German list, against #411 for "mag". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "mag" and "mir" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mag" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mir" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,005,804 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mag" and "mir" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mir vs mora". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #2,005,804 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list