Which to use
“maires” and “miles” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #5,362
- “maires” frequency rank
- #8,274
- “miles” frequency rank
- 13636
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | maires | miles |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pluriel de maire. | Pluriel de mile. |
Where the eye mixes maires and miles
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. maires runs 6 letters (CVVCVC) against miles's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses maires with miles
A purely visual mix-up. maires (\mɛʁ\) and miles (\majls\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13636, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
maires is recorded at frequency rank #5,362, classified as anoun, pronounced \mɛʁ\. miles is at rank #8,274, tagged as anoun, pronounced \majls\.
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 13636, this pair ranks #400,187 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of maires vs miles
Shared letters: eims. Private to "maires": ar. Private to "miles": l.
"maires" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC · "miles" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "maires" and "miles" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "maires" or "miles" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "maires" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "miles" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #400,187 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "maires" and "miles" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "miles vs Milla". 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 #400,187 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.