mal
[ˈmal]
The verdict
“mal” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #193) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #193
- frequency rank, Spanish
- 3,868
- “M” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Carencia de bondad.
Corpus desk
Index ES-mal · mal · Spanish
mal · rank #193 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-CORE #193
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,868
- PHOTO-FINISH además
Nearest frequency peer: además (-1 rank slots)
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 neighbourhood for “mal”
Lower corpus rank = more everyday usage (inverted bar length for readability)
- mayor
mayor
99,811 corpus weight
- Tal
Tal
99,810 corpus weight
- además
además
99,809 corpus weight
- mal
mal
99,808 corpus weight
- muchas
muchas
99,807 corpus weight
- primer
primer
99,806 corpus weight
What this shows Bars show where “mal” sits against the nearest ranked Spanish headwords in the FrequencyWords band, not a reprint of letter-browse containment.
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 | mal |
| Language | Spanish |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | [ˈmal] |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #193 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Dónde se sitúa “mal” en la frecuencia del español
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for mal is neighbouring look-alikes ("mi", "mm", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced [ˈmal]. Frequency #193 among 3,868 “M” headwords. 4 recorded senses keep meaning in play.
Zero misspellings are on record for mal in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable Spanish rules. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "mi", "mm", "my", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Our source data has no etymology on file for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct Spanish form is mal, spelled M-A-L.
Definition
- 1Carencia de bondad.
- 2Daño material o moral.
- 3Infortunio causante de perjuicios.
- 4Condición anormal del cuerpo que daña o corrompe sus funciones normales, que causa incomodidad o que deteriora la salud.
Antonyms
This word in other languages
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 Spanish corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar Spanish words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "mal", not the corpus desk frequency band.
What to do next
You've looked up "mal". Here's where to go from here.
- "mal" maps to 20 confusable pairs in this vintage; the highest-scored is "mi". View pair
- Usage frequency rank #193 among Spanish headwords in this corpus. Corpus statistics
- Browse more Spanish words in the "M" letter cohort. M–Z browse
PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.
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.