memevsmeuWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#8,170
“meme” frequency rank
#48,897
“meu” frequency rank
57067
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature meme meu
Definition Any unit of (originally cultural) information, such as a practice or idea, that is transmitted verbally or by repeated action from one mind to another in a comparable way to the transmission of genes. Meum athamanticum, a European herb.

Where the eye mixes meme and meu

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

4 ch
meme
3 ch
meu

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. meme (/miːm/) and meu (/ˈmjuː/) 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 57067, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

meme is recorded at frequency rank #8,170, classified as anoun, pronounced /miːm/. meu is at rank #48,897, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈmjuː/.

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 57067, this pair ranks #121,819 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of meme vs meu

Shared letters: em. Private to "meme": -. Private to "meu": u.

"meme" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "meu" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • memeemme · meem · memme · mmee · mmeme

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "meme" and "meu" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/miːm/ versus /ˈmjuː/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "meme" or "meu"?
"meme" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,170 in our English list, against #48,897 for "meu". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list