maysvsphotoConfusable pair

Which to use

“mays” and “photo” are a confusable German pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#44,064
“mays” frequency rank
#13,909
“photo” frequency rank
57973
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mays photo
Definition das Artepitheton für den Mais (Zea mays) Foto

Letter map: mays vs photo

Shared letters muted; letters that set mays and photo apart highlighted. No shared letter run. mays runs 4 letters (CVVC) against photo's 5 (CCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
mays
5 ch
photo

Spelling & dictionary notes on mays vs photo

mays and photo are indexed as a confusable German pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57973, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mays is recorded at frequency rank #44,064, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. photo is at rank #13,909, tagged as anoun, 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 57973, this pair ranks #880,540 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of mays vs photo

Shared letters: none. Private to "mays": amsy. Private to "photo": hopt.

"mays" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "photo" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mays ← amys · masy · mayss · mayys · mmays · myas
  • photo ← hpoto · phhoto · phoot · photto · phtoo · pohto · pphoto

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "mays" for "photo" ever safe?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "mays" vs "photo" - which ranks higher?
"photo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,909 in our German list, against #44,064 for "mays". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "mays" vs "photo" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mays" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "photo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #880,540 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mays" and "photo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mays vs puzzles". 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 #880,540 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