mabvsmaneWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“mab” and “mane” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#47,175
“mab” frequency rank
#18,883
“mane” frequency rank
66058
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mab mane
Definition A slattern. Longer hair growth on back of neck of an animal, especially a horse or lion.

Letter map: mab vs mane

Shared letters muted; letters that set mab and mane apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
mab
4 ch
mane

Pair insight - mab / mane

mab and mane are indexed as a confusable English 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 66058, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mab is recorded at frequency rank #47,175, classified as anoun. mane is at rank #18,883, tagged as anoun, pronounced /meɪn/.

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 66058, this pair ranks #69,827 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of mab vs mane

Shared letters: am. Private to "mab": b. Private to "mane": en.

"mab" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "mane" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • manemanne · mmane · mnae

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "mab" and "mane" mean the same thing in a sentence?
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.
In ordinary English text, does "mab" or "mane" show up more?
"mane" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,883 in our English list, against #47,175 for "mab". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "mab" and "mane".

  • Full dictionary entry for "mab" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mane" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #69,827 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mab" and "mane" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mab vs MPAA". 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 #69,827 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list