medvsmouTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#19,490
“med” frequency rank
#46,072
“mou” frequency rank
65562
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature med mou
Definition Miel. Blando.

Where the eye mixes med and mou

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

3 ch
med
3 ch
mou

Visual trap between med and mou

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: med is [mɛt] while mou is [mu]. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 65562, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

med is recorded at frequency rank #19,490, classified as anoun, pronounced [mɛt]. mou is at rank #46,072, tagged as anadj, pronounced [mu].

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 65562, this pair ranks #42,275 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of med vs mou

Shared letters: m. Private to "med": de. Private to "mou": ou.

"med" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "mou" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "med" and "mou" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "med" is a noun and "mou" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "med" or "mou" show up more?
"med" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,490 in our Spanish list, against #46,072 for "mou". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "med" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mou" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #42,275 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "med" and "mou" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mou vs mur". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #42,275 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