mah vs Mai, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“mah” is an intj and “Mai” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#29,420
“mah” frequency rank: #9,369
“Mai” frequency rank: 38789
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	mah	Mai
Definition	usada para chamar ou deter alguém, ou para chamar sua atenção	maio

Letter map: mah vs Mai

Shared letters muted; letters that set mah and Mai apart highlighted. Shared run: 2. mah (CVC) and Mai (CVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

3 ch

mah

3 ch

Mai

Role in the sentence - mah and Mai

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: mah is anintj and Maianoun. On the page they differ by a single letter - h in “mah” becomes i in “Mai”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38789, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mah is recorded at frequency rank #29,420, classified as anintj. Mai is at rank #9,369, tagged as anoun, pronounced /maɪ̯/.

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 38789, this pair ranks #27,592 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of mah vs Mai

Shared letters: am. Private to "mah": h. Private to "Mai": i.

"mah" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "Mai" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "mah" and "Mai" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mah" is an intj and "Mai" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "mah" or "Mai"?

"Mai" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,369 in our Portuguese list, against #29,420 for "mah". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "mah" and "Mai".

Full dictionary entry for "mah" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "Mai" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #27,592 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"mah" and "Mai" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maa vs mah". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #27,592 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.