mahévsmileConfusable pair

Quick tell: mahé is a postp, mile is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“mahé” is a postp and “mile” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#44,035
“mahé” frequency rank
#15,682
“mile” frequency rank
59717
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mahé mile
Definition Dans, dedans. Unité de mesure de longueur anglo-saxonne, valant 1,760 yards (verges), soit 5,280 pieds, ou encore exactement 1 609,344 mètres. Son symbole est mi.

Where the eye mixes mahé and mile

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

4 ch
mahé
4 ch
mile

Look-alike desk: mahé vs mile

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: mahé is \ma.ˈhe\ while mile is \majl\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (postp vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59717, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mahé is recorded at frequency rank #44,035, classified as apostp, pronounced \ma.ˈhe\. mile is at rank #15,682, tagged as anoun, pronounced \majl\.

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 59717, this pair ranks #101,567 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of mahé vs mile

Shared letters: m. Private to "mahé": ahé. Private to "mile": eil.

"mahé" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "mile" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mileimle · mlie · mmile

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "mahé" and "mile" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mahé" is a postp and "mile" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "mahé" or "mile"?
"mile" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #15,682 in our French list, against #44,035 for "mahé". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "mahé" and "mile" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mahé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mile" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #101,567 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mahé" and "mile" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mahé vs MWh". 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 #101,567 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