mec
\mɛk\
The verdict
“mec” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #519) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #519
- frequency rank, French
- 5,038
- “M” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Individu de sexe ou genre masculin.
Corpus desk
Index FR-mec · mec · French
mec · rank #519 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-CORE #519
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,038
- PHOTO-FINISH fond
Nearest frequency peer: fond (-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 « mec »
Pairs de poids proche dans le corpus, séparés des confusables ci-dessous
- droite
droite
99,485 corpus weight
- environ
environ
99,484 corpus weight
- fond
fond
99,483 corpus weight
- mec
mec
99,482 corpus weight
- mesure
mesure
99,481 corpus weight
- ouais
ouais
99,480 corpus weight
What this shows Les barres placent « mec » face aux lemmes français les plus proches par rang, pas un reprint du bureau des confusables.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | mec |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \mɛk\ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #519 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Rang de corpus près des confusables de « mec »
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for mec is neighbouring look-alikes ("mm", "mi", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced \mɛk\. Frequency #519 among 5,038 “M” headwords. 5 recorded senses keep meaning in play.
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for mec, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "mm", "mi", "MR", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct French form is mec, spelled M-E-C.
Definition
- 1Individu de sexe ou genre masculin.
- 2Homme d’un couple (s’utilise en général avec un possessif).
- 3Homme énergique, chef.
- 4Souteneur ; maquereau.
- 5Acronyme de « M.E.C. » signifiant « Mis En Cause » dans les procédures judiciaires effectuées par les gendarmes et les policiers dans leurs procès verbaux.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how mec appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Tu es dans un monde de mecs, ici. Et dans le monde des mecs, il y a des bouquins de cul et bien d'autres choses, parfois même des femmes. Mais jamais longtemps.
Un mec qui sait échanger par textos, moi, je trouve ça hyperséduisant.
This word in other languages
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
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Similar French words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "mec", not the corpus desk frequency band.