makesvsmêmesWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: makes is a noun, mêmes is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“makes” is a noun and “mêmes” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#41,884
“makes” frequency rank
#571
“mêmes” frequency rank
42455
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature makes mêmes
Definition Pluriel de make. Pluriel de même.

Where the eye mixes makes and mêmes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
makes
5 ch
mêmes

Visual trap between makes and mêmes

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: makes is \ˈmeɪks\ while mêmes is \mɛm\. 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 42455, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

makes is recorded at frequency rank #41,884, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈmeɪks\. mêmes is at rank #571, tagged as anadj, pronounced \mɛm\.

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 42455, this pair ranks #225,481 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of makes vs mêmes

Shared letters: ems. Private to "makes": ak. Private to "mêmes": ê.

"makes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "mêmes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • makesamkes · maeks · makess · makkes · makse · mkaes · mmakes

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "makes" for "mêmes" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "makes" is a noun and "mêmes" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "makes" vs "mêmes" - which ranks higher?
"mêmes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #571 in our French list, against #41,884 for "makes". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "makes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mêmes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #225,481 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "makes" and "mêmes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Maël vs makes". 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 #225,481 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