manvsmoWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: man is a noun, mo is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“man” is a noun and “mo” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#2,571
“man” frequency rank
#7,460
“mo” frequency rank
10031
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature man mo
Definition Variante obsoleta de mano. Mi, mío.

Letter map: man vs mo

Shared letters muted; letters that set man and mo apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch
man
2 ch
mo

Role in the sentence - man and mo

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: man is anoun and moanadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10031, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

man is recorded at frequency rank #2,571, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈmãn]. mo is at rank #7,460, tagged as anadj.

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 10031, this pair ranks #300,061 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of man vs mo

Shared letters: m. Private to "man": an. Private to "mo": o.

"man" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "mo" · 2 letters · shape CV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "man" for "mo" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "man" is a noun and "mo" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "man" or "mo"?
"man" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,571 in our Spanish list, against #7,460 for "mo". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "man" and "mo".

  • Full dictionary entry for "man" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #300,061 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "man" and "mo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mo vs mur". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #300,061 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