Which to use
“madre” is a noun and “maigre” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #33,769
- “madre” frequency rank
- #8,733
- “maigre” frequency rank
- 42502
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | madre | maigre |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Bois veiné, ou tacheté issus du cœur ou de la racine et généralement utilisé pour confectionner des récipients pour boire | Qui contient peu ou pas de graisse ou de liant. |
Where the eye mixes madre and maigre
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. madre runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against maigre's 6 (CVVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: madre vs maigre
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: madre is \madʁ\ while maigre is \mɛɡʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 42502, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
madre is recorded at frequency rank #33,769, classified as anoun, pronounced \madʁ\. maigre is at rank #8,733, tagged as anadj, pronounced \mɛɡʁ\.
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 42502, this pair ranks #225,130 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of madre vs maigre
Shared letters: aemr. Private to "madre": d. Private to "maigre": gi.
"madre" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "maigre" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "madre" and "maigre" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "madre" or "maigre"?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "madre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "maigre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #225,130 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "madre" and "maigre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "madre vs magret". 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 #225,130 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.