mer
"mer" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“mer” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #19,904) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #19,904
- frequency rank, English
- 4,057
- “M” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A repeat unit: a structural unit which through repetition forms a polymer.
Corpus desk
Index EN-mer · mer · English
mer · rank #19,904 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #19,904
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,057
- PHOTO-FINISH meow
Nearest frequency peer: meow (-1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Frequency neighbours of confusable “mer”
Peers at similar corpus weight, separate from look-alike pairs below
- mediator
mediator
80,101 corpus weight
- Mein
Mein
80,100 corpus weight
- meow
meow
80,098 corpus weight
- mer
mer
80,097 corpus weight
- mirage
mirage
80,095 corpus weight
- mockery
mockery
80,094 corpus weight
What this shows Bars place “mer” against nearest ranked English headwords, not a reprint of the confusable-pair desk.
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 | mer |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #19,904 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Corpus rank beside confusables of “mer”
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for mer is neighbouring look-alikes ("my", "Mr", …), not just typos; it is anoun. Frequency #19,904 among 4,057 “M” headwords. Gloss: "A repeat unit: a structural unit which through repetition forms a polymer.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for mer, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "my", "Mr", "MS", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: Clipping of polymer. The correct English form is mer, spelled M-E-R.
Definition
- 1A repeat unit: a structural unit which through repetition forms a polymer.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how mer appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
A polymer is a compound formed of repeating structural units called mers, whose atoms share electrons to form very large molecules.
Etymology
Clipping of polymer.
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
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "mer", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).