Which to use
“maille” is a noun and “mainte” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #18,248
- “maille” frequency rank
- #45,723
- “mainte” frequency rank
- 63971
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | maille | mainte |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Chacune des boucles que forment des fils croisés ou noués en un point et qui constituent un tissu plus ou moins lâche. | Féminin singulier de maint. |
Where the eye mixes maille and mainte
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. maille and mainte follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Why the eye confuses maille with mainte
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: maille is \mɑj\ while mainte is \mɛ̃t\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63971, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
maille is recorded at frequency rank #18,248, classified as anoun, pronounced \mɑj\. mainte is at rank #45,723, 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 63971, this pair ranks #79,312 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of maille vs mainte
Shared letters: aeim. Private to "maille": l. Private to "mainte": nt.
"maille" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV · "mainte" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "maille" and "mainte" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "maille" or "mainte"?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "maille" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "mainte" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #79,312 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "maille" and "mainte" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mainte vs mane". 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 #79,312 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.