Which to use
“mare” and “mitre” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #13,015
- “mare” frequency rank
- #45,521
- “mitre” frequency rank
- 58536
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | mare | mitre |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | An adult female horse. | A covering for the head, worn on solemn occasions by church dignitaries, which has been made in many forms, mostly recently a tall cap with two points or peaks. |
Where the eye mixes mare and mitre
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between mare and mitre
A purely visual mix-up. mare (/mɛə/) and mitre (/ˈmaɪtəɹ/) 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 58536, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
mare is recorded at frequency rank #13,015, classified as anoun, pronounced /mɛə/. mitre is at rank #45,521, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈmaɪtəɹ/.
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 58536, this pair ranks #111,895 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of mare vs mitre
Shared letters: emr. Private to "mare": a. Private to "mitre": it.
"mare" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "mitre" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "mare" and "mitre" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "mare" or "mitre" show up more?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "mare" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "mitre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #111,895 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "mare" and "mitre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mitral vs mitre". 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 #111,895 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.