maavsmaisWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: maa is a noun, mais is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“maa” is a noun and “mais” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#48,525
“maa” frequency rank
#23
“mais” frequency rank
48548
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature maa mais
Definition chão, solo avançadamente (designa aumento)

Letter map: maa vs mais

Shared letters muted; letters that set maa and mais apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
maa
4 ch
mais

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: maa is anoun and maisanadverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48548, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

maa is recorded at frequency rank #48,525, classified as anoun. mais is at rank #23, tagged as anadv, pronounced /mäjʃ/.

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 48548, this pair ranks #16,616 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of maa vs mais

Shared letters: am. Private to "maa": -. Private to "mais": is.

"maa" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "mais" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • maisamis · maiss · masi · mias · mmais

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "maa" and "mais" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "maa" is a noun and "mais" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "maa" or "mais"?
"mais" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23 in our Portuguese list, against #48,525 for "maa". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

You've compared "maa" and "mais". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "maa" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mais" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #16,616 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "maa" and "mais" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maa vs malva". 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

PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list