matevsMRTWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#2,743
“mate” frequency rank
#40,351
“MRT” frequency rank
43094
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mate MRT
Definition A fellow, comrade, colleague, partner or someone with whom something is shared, e.g. shipmate, classmate. Initialism of magnetic resonance tomography.

Where the eye mixes mate and MRT

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
mate
3 ch
MRT

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. mate (/meɪt/) and MRT (/ɛm ɑː(ɹ)tiː/) 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 43094, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mate is recorded at frequency rank #2,743, classified as anoun, pronounced /meɪt/. MRT is at rank #40,351, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ɛm ɑː(ɹ)tiː/.

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 43094, this pair ranks #243,286 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of mate vs MRT

Shared letters: mt. Private to "mate": ae. Private to "MRT": r.

"mate" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "MRT" · 3 letters · shape CCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mateamte · mmate · mtae

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "mate" and "MRT" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/meɪt/ versus /ɛm ɑː(ɹ)tiː/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "mate" or "MRT"?
"mate" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,743 in our English list, against #40,351 for "MRT". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list