Which to use
“maine” is an adjective and “maïs” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #8,880
- “maine” frequency rank
- #6,849
- “maïs” frequency rank
- 15729
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | maine | maïs |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Grand. | Nom vernaculaire de Zea mays subsp. mays, — et de ses cultivars —, plante herbacée de la famille des Poaceae (ou Poacées ou Graminées), originaire du Mexique et du Guatemala, à tige droite et aux feuilles lancéolées, et que l’on cultive comme plante fourragère ou pour ses graines. |
Letter map: maine vs maïs
Shared letters muted; letters that set maine and maïs apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.
Role in the sentence - maine and maïs
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: maine is anadjective and maïsanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 15729, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
maine is recorded at frequency rank #8,880, classified as anadj. maïs is at rank #6,849, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ma.is\.
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 15729, this pair ranks #391,081 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of maine vs maïs
Shared letters: am. Private to "maine": ein. Private to "maïs": sï.
"maine" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV · "maïs" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
- maine ← maien · mainne · miane · mmaine
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "maine" and "maïs" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "maine" or "maïs" show up more?
Useful next steps
Pair "maine" vs "maïs" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "maine" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "maïs" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #391,081 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "maine" and "maïs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maid vs maine". 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 #391,081 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.