memovsmengWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: memo is a noun, meng is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“memo” is a noun and “meng” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,793
“memo” frequency rank
#48,041
“meng” frequency rank
97834
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature memo meng
Definition Mémo, aide-mémoire. Ma, la mienne.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set memo and meng apart are highlighted. They share 2 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

4 ch
memo
4 ch
meng

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: memo is \ˈmɛm.əʊ̯\ while meng is \meŋ\. 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 pronoun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 97834, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

memo is recorded at frequency rank #49,793, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈmɛm.əʊ̯\. meng is at rank #48,041, tagged as apron, pronounced \meŋ\.

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 97834, this pair ranks #246 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of memo vs meng

Shared letters: em. Private to "memo": o. Private to "meng": gn.

"memo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "meng" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • memoemmo · memmo · meom · mmemo · mmeo
  • mengemng · megn · mengg · menng · mmeng · mneg

Frequency comparison

memo#49,793
meng#48,041

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "memo" and "meng" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "memo" is a noun and "meng" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "memo" or "meng"?
"meng" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #48,041 in our French list, against #49,793 for "memo". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering memo vs meng

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “memo”; for a pronoun, it's “meng”.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “memo” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list