MaríavsmauriWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: María is a name, mauri is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“María” is a name and “mauri” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#749
“María” frequency rank
#28,836
“mauri” frequency rank
29585
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature María mauri
Definition Nombre de pila de mujer, popular en países de tradición cristiana por ser el nombre de la madre de Jesús. (Trichomycterus pictus) Pez de hasta 20 cm de largo, cuerpo delgado sin escamas y manchas oscuras sobre un fondo gris y cabeza chata. Nativo de Perú y Bolivia.

Where the eye mixes María and mauri

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. María (CVCVV) and mauri (CVVCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
María
5 ch
mauri

Look-alike desk: María vs mauri

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: María is [maˈɾia] while mauri is [ˈmawɾi]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (name vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29585, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

María is recorded at frequency rank #749, classified as aname, pronounced [maˈɾia]. mauri is at rank #28,836, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈmawɾi].

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 29585, this pair ranks #216,263 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of María vs mauri

Shared letters: amr. Private to "María": í. Private to "mauri": iu.

"María" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "mauri" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mauriamuri · marui · mauir · maurri · mmauri · muari

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "María" and "mauri" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "María" is a name and "mauri" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "María" or "mauri"?
"María" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #749 in our Spanish list, against #28,836 for "mauri". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "María" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mauri" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #216,263 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "María" and "mauri" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mauri vs mur". 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 #216,263 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