Magic E and no Magic E minimal pairs
listed by level
“Magic E” is the name of a very common and useful spelling and pronunciation pattern in English. Final “-e” after a short vowel sound and single consonant makes the sound of the vowel change to a long sound or diphthong, as in “hat” and “hate”. The simplified rule is that Magic E after a single consonant makes the vowel “say its name”, for example:
- /ei/ like the name of the letter A in “same”
- /i:/ like the name of the letter E in “mete”
This is a complete list of common pairs of words with and without Magic E like “plan” and “plane”. Although there are many other common words with Magic E, these minimal pairs are the most useful for presenting and practising the effect while also learning useful vocabulary, and are often the most typical confusions.
To make enough pairs for each short vowel sound, this list includes examples with common people’s names (“Tim” and “time”) and with the suffix -er in the place of Magic E (“dinner” and “diner”). Even so, some levels have no suitable examples of the very rare e + Magic E (“gen” and “gene”, etc).
Elementary-level Magic E and no Magic E pairs
- hat hate
- mad made
- plan plane
- Sam same
- pet Pete
- dinner diner
- Tim time
- not note
- cut cute
Pre-intermediate-level Magic E and no Magic E pairs
- at ate
- cap cape
- mat mate
- tap tape
- bit bite
- hid hide
- quit quite
- sit site
- slim slime
- win wine
- hop hope
- rob robe
- supper super
Intermediate-level Magic E and no Magic E pairs
- can cane
- fat fate
- latter later
- pal pale
- rat rate
- kit kite
- pin pine
- rip ripe
- strip stripe
- rod rode
- cub cube
Upper-intermediate-level Magic E and no Magic E pairs
- fad fade
- gen gene
- dim dime
- fin fine
- pip pipe
- rid ride
- shin shine
- slid slide
- ’til tile
- spit spite
- cod code
- con cone
- cop cope
- pop pope
- rot rote
- wok woke
- tub tube
Advanced-level Magic E and no Magic E pairs
- ban bane
- cam came
- dam dame
- gal gale
- glad glade
- lam lame
- man mane
- nap nape
- pan pane
- pat pate
- sat sate
- sham shame
- slat slate
- spat spate
- trad trade
- van vane
- met mete
- bid bide
- bill bile
- din dine
- grim grime
- grip gripe
- mitt mite
- prim prime
- sin sine
- still stile
- trip tripe
- bod bode
- dot dote
- lop lope
- mod mode
- mop mope
- nod node
- slop slope
- tot tote
- crud crude
- dud dude
- dun dune
- glut glute
- jut jute
- plum plume
- rub rube
- run rune