Maasai
/ˈmɑːsaɪ/
"maasai" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Maasai” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #46,598 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #46,598
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 3
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A member of an indigenous people in Kenya and Tanzania.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Maasai |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈmɑːsaɪ/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #46,598 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 3 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Maasai” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Maasai is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈmɑːsaɪ/. Corpus data places it at rank #46,598 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A member of an indigenous people in Kenya and Tanzania.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for Maasai, with forms such as "amasai", "maaasi", and "maasia". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 3 confusable-pair relationships, "masa", "massa", "maas", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct English form is Maasai, spelled M-A-A-S-A-I.
Definition
- 1A member of an indigenous people in Kenya and Tanzania.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: amasai,maaasi,maasia,maassai,masaai,masai,mmaasai
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Maasai - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "Maasai"?
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Using “Maasai”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is M-A-A-S-A-I - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈmɑːsaɪ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “masa” - see the side-by-side comparison. Maasai vs masa
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.