mail

\maj\

/\maj\/ noun

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“mail” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #2,936) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#2,936
frequency rank, French
5,038
“M” headwords
4
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Petite masse cylindrique de bois, à long manche, dont on se servait pour jouer en poussant, en chassant avec force une boule de buis.

Corpus desk

Index FR-mail · mail · French

mail · rank #2,936 · 4 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-COMMON #2,936
  • LEN-MID 4 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-LOW 4 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 5,038
  • PHOTO-FINISH Madrid

Nearest frequency peer: Madrid (-1 rank slots)

Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.

Voisins de fréquence du confusable « mail »

Pairs de poids proche dans le corpus, séparés des confusables ci-dessous

corpus weight

What this shows Les barres placent « mail » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

mail vs mi
50% similar
mail vs ML
0% similar
mail vs moi
50% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for mail
PropertyValue
Headwordmail
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\maj\
Letters4
Frequency rank#2,936
Misspellings tracked4
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rang de corpus près des confusables de « mail »

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.mailse place ici:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Dans la même bande de rareté figurent « Madrid » (#2,935), « montrent » (#2,937), « lèvres » (#2,934). Parmi 5,038 lemmes en « M », « mail » est au #2,936. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for mail is neighbouring look-alikes ("mi", "ML", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced \maj\. Frequency #2,936 among 5,038 “M” headwords. 7 recorded senses keep meaning in play.

Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for mail, with forms such as "amil", "maill", and "mial". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "mi", "ML", "moi", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct French form is mail, spelled M-A-I-L.

Definition

  1. 1
    Petite masse cylindrique de bois, à long manche, dont on se servait pour jouer en poussant, en chassant avec force une boule de buis.
  2. 2
    Jeu où l’on fait usage du mail.
  3. 3
    Lieu, l’allée où l’on joue au mail.
  4. 4
    Dans quelques villes, pour désigner la promenade publique où l’on jouait autrefois au mail.
  5. 5
    Gros marteau dont se sert le carrier pour enfoncer les coins entre les joints ou dans les entailles des pierres.
  6. 6
    Travail, boulot.
  7. 7
    Véhicule de transport collectif dans certaines villes.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how mail appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. Donner un coup de mail.
  2. Voilà un beau coup de mail.

This word in other languages

mall(English)

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • amil
  • maill
  • mial
  • mmail

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of mail - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.

amil2maill1mial2mmail1
Edit distance from "mail"

Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 French corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "mail"?
"mail" is spelled M-A-I-L. The IPA pronunciation is \maj\.
What does "mail" mean?
As a noun, "mail" means: Petite masse cylindrique de bois, à long manche, dont on se servait pour jouer en poussant, en chassant avec force une boule de buis.
What words are commonly confused with "mail"?
"mail" is commonly confused with "mi", "ML", "moi". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "mail"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "mail" is \maj\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "mail" come from?
"mail" is a French word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar French words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "mail", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 4 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

sexy#2,963news#2,887mine#2,885Eric#2,876

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list