mentevsmenúConfusable pair

Which to use

“mente” and “menú” are a confusable Spanish pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#941
“mente” frequency rank
#9,322
“menú” frequency rank
10263
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mente menú
Definition Entidad incorporea, inmaterial, supuesta sede de la imaginación, la conciencia, la reflexión, la intuición, la voluntad. Colección de alimentos que se incluyen en una comida.

Where the eye mixes mente and menú

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
mente
4 ch
menú

Why the eye confuses mente with menú

A purely visual mix-up. mente ([ˈmẽn̪t̪e]) and menú ([meˈnu]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10263, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mente is recorded at frequency rank #941, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈmẽn̪t̪e]. menú is at rank #9,322, tagged as anoun, pronounced [meˈnu].

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 10263, this pair ranks #299,252 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of mente vs menú

Shared letters: emn. Private to "mente": t. Private to "menú": ú.

"mente" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "menú" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • menteemnte · menet · mennte · mentte · metne · mmente · mnete

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "mente" and "menú" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently ([ˈmẽn̪t̪e] versus [meˈnu]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "mente" vs "menú" - which ranks higher?
"mente" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #941 in our Spanish list, against #9,322 for "menú". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "mente" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "menú" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #299,252 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mente" and "menú" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "menú vs mou". 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 #299,252 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