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Currrently both and have a fair amount of questions. Neither had a tag wiki and the questions on both seem to have the same subjects. Is there any reason they shouldn't be made synonyms?

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On this NASA page on inlets it says:

In England, inlets are called intakes, which is a more accurate description of their function at low aircraft speeds.

So it depends on SE's manual of style, I'm not sure if it's been discussed before, but I think AmE is used for tags (e.g. with a z). In this case intake, despite being more descriptive, can be the synonym.

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I don't know if I'd really say they are the same. They are used interchangeably, but "intake" generally makes me think of an engine, whereas "inlet" makes me think of a smaller opening for something else, like for the a/c packs or something. Inlet sounds odd for the engine intake. The suffix "-let" is a diminutive, usually indicating a smaller version of something else. Like "piglet" or "winglet." I've heard people use "inlet" for engines, but it doesn't sound right to me.

Interesting side note: I found out from @mins that "winglet" is basically the English equivalent of the French "aileron."

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    $\begingroup$ You have a good point from the language perspective but in my experience it would be the other way around. $\endgroup$
    – fooot
    Apr 5, 2018 at 20:15
  • $\begingroup$ @fooot I see it on here a lot, but it never sounded right to me $\endgroup$
    – TomMcW
    Apr 5, 2018 at 20:18

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