Which to use
“mages” and “magnet” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #45,499
- “mages” frequency rank
- #10,724
- “magnet” frequency rank
- 56223
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | mages | magnet |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | plural of mage | A piece of material that attracts some metals by magnetism. |
Where the eye mixes mages and magnet
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. mages runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against magnet's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between mages and magnet
A purely visual mix-up. mages (/ˈmeɪ.d͡ʒɪz/) and magnet (/ˈmæɡ.nɪt/) 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 56223, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
mages is recorded at frequency rank #45,499, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈmeɪ.d͡ʒɪz/. magnet is at rank #10,724, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈmæɡ.nɪt/.
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 56223, this pair ranks #127,817 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of mages vs magnet
Shared letters: aegm. Private to "mages": s. Private to "magnet": nt.
"mages" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "magnet" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "mages" and "magnet" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "mages" or "magnet" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "mages" and "magnet" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "mages" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "magnet" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #127,817 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "mages" and "magnet" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mages vs MGS". 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 #127,817 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.