mintsvsmonthsWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#28,295
“mints” frequency rank
#446
“months” frequency rank
28741
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mints months
Definition plural of mint plural of month

Where the eye mixes mints and months

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
mints
6 ch
months

Look-alike desk: mints vs months

A purely visual mix-up. mints (/mɪnts/) and months (/mʌnθs/) 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 28741, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mints is recorded at frequency rank #28,295, classified as anoun, pronounced /mɪnts/. months is at rank #446, tagged as anoun, pronounced /mʌnθs/.

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 28741, this pair ranks #368,679 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of mints vs months

Shared letters: mnst. Private to "mints": i. Private to "months": ho.

"mints" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "months" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mintsimnts · minnts · minst · mintss · mintts · mitns · mmints · mnits
  • monthsmmonths · mnoths · monhts · monnths · monthhs · monthss · montsh · montths

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "mints" for "months" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/mɪnts/ versus /mʌnθs/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary English text, does "mints" or "months" show up more?
"months" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #446 in our English list, against #28,295 for "mints". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mints" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "months" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #368,679 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mints" and "months" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Minot vs mints". 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 #368,679 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