maigresvsmaintesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#17,476
“maigres” frequency rank
#10,028
“maintes” frequency rank
27504
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature maigres maintes
Definition Pluriel de maigre. Féminin pluriel de maint.

Where the eye mixes maigres and maintes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. maigres and maintes follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
maigres
7 ch
maintes

Why the eye confuses maigres with maintes

A purely visual mix-up. maigres (\mɛɡʁ\) and maintes (\mɛ̃t\) 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 27504, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

maigres is recorded at frequency rank #17,476, classified as anadj, pronounced \mɛɡʁ\. maintes is at rank #10,028, tagged as anadj, pronounced \mɛ̃t\.

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 27504, this pair ranks #328,552 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of maigres vs maintes

Shared letters: aeims. Private to "maigres": gr. Private to "maintes": nt.

"maigres" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC  ·  "maintes" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • maigres ← amigres · magires · maigers · maiggres · maigress · maigrres · maigrse · mairges
  • maintes ← amintes · mainets · mainntes · maintess · maintse · mainttes · maitnes · manites

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "maigres" and "maintes" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\mɛɡʁ\ versus \mɛ̃t\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "maigres" vs "maintes" - which ranks higher?
"maintes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,028 in our French list, against #17,476 for "maigres". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "maigres" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "maintes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #328,552 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "maigres" and "maintes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "magret vs maigres". 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 #328,552 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