maisvsmanyTell them apart

Quick tell: mais is a conjunction, many is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“mais” is a conjunction and “many” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#32,283
“mais” frequency rank
#26,520
“many” frequency rank
58803
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mais many
Definition Pero. Mucho

Where the eye mixes mais and many

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

4 ch
mais
4 ch
many

Why the eye confuses mais with many

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: mais is [mɛ] while many is /ˈmɛn.i/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (conjunction vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58803, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mais is recorded at frequency rank #32,283, classified as aconj, pronounced [mɛ]. many is at rank #26,520, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈmɛn.i/.

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 58803, this pair ranks #65,082 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of mais vs many

Shared letters: am. Private to "mais": is. Private to "many": ny.

"mais" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "many" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • maismaiss · masi · mmais
  • manyamny · manny · manyy · mayn · mmany · mnay

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "mais" and "many" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mais" is a conjunction and "many" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "mais" vs "many" - which ranks higher?
"many" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,520 in our Spanish list, against #32,283 for "mais". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "mais" and "many" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "many" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #65,082 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mais" and "many" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mais vs makes". 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 #65,082 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list