macrosvsmadrasTell them apart

Which to use

“macros” and “madras” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#49,776
“macros” frequency rank
#40,852
“madras” frequency rank
90628
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature macros madras
Definition Pluriel de macro. Étoffe dont la chaîne est de soie et la trame de coton, et qui est ainsi nommée parce qu’elle a été fabriquée d’abord à Madras, ville de l’Inde.

Where the eye mixes macros and madras

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
macros
6 ch
madras

Visual trap between macros and madras

A purely visual mix-up. macros (\ma.kʁo\) and madras (\ma.dʁɑs\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 90628, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

macros is recorded at frequency rank #49,776, classified as anoun, pronounced \ma.kʁo\. madras is at rank #40,852, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ma.dʁɑs\.

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 90628, this pair ranks #4,610 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of macros vs madras

Shared letters: amrs. Private to "macros": co. Private to "madras": d.

"macros" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "madras" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • macrosamcros · maccros · macors · macross · macrros · macrso · mcaros · mmacros
  • madrasamdras · madars · maddras · madrass · madrras · madrsa · mardas · mdaras

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "macros" and "madras" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ma.kʁo\ versus \ma.dʁɑs\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "macros" or "madras" show up more?
"madras" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #40,852 in our French list, against #49,776 for "macros". 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 "macros" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "madras" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #4,610 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "macros" and "madras" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "macros vs microns". 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 #4,610 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list