Which to use
“many” is an adjective and “Mary” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #20,338
- “many” frequency rank
- #4,536
- “Mary” frequency rank
- 24874
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | many | Mary |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | viele | weiblicher Vorname |
Letter map: many vs Mary
Shared letters muted; letters that set many and Mary apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.
Part-of-speech tell for many / Mary
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: many is anadjective and Maryaname. On the page they differ by a single letter - n in “many” becomes r in “Mary”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24874, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
many is recorded at frequency rank #20,338, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈmɛn.i]. Mary is at rank #4,536, tagged as aname, pronounced […].
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 24874, this pair ranks #1,841,389 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of many vs Mary
Shared letters: amy. Private to "many": n. Private to "Mary": r.
"many" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "Mary" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "many" for "Mary" ever safe?
Which is more common, "many" or "Mary"?
Useful next steps
Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "many" and "Mary".
- Full dictionary entry for "many" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "Mary" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #1,841,389 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "many" and "Mary" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Mals vs many". 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 #1,841,389 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.