marivsmidiConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#1,335
“mari” frequency rank
#847
“midi” frequency rank
2182
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mari midi
Definition Homme uni à une autre personne par les liens du mariage, époux. Moment où le Soleil est le plus haut dans le ciel, qui partage également la durée du jour entre le soleil levant et le soleil couchant.

Where the eye mixes mari and midi

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
mari
4 ch
midi

Why the eye confuses mari with midi

A purely visual mix-up. mari (\ma.ʁi\) and midi (\mi.di\) 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 2182, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mari is recorded at frequency rank #1,335, classified as anoun, pronounced \ma.ʁi\. midi is at rank #847, tagged as anoun, pronounced \mi.di\.

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 2182, this pair ranks #436,625 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of mari vs midi

Shared letters: im. Private to "mari": ar. Private to "midi": d.

"mari" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "midi" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mariamri · mair · marri · mmari · mrai
  • midiimdi · mdii · middi · miid · mmidi

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "mari" for "midi" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ma.ʁi\ versus \mi.di\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "mari" or "midi"?
"midi" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #847 in our French list, against #1,335 for "mari". 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 "mari" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "midi" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #436,625 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mari" and "midi" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maid vs mari". 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 #436,625 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