～まい — Surely Not / I Won't
A formal, somewhat literary auxiliary with two uses: negative volition ('I will not / I have no intention of') and negative conjecture ('probably not / surely not'). It is the negative counterpart of ～う/よう (volitional) and ～だろう (conjecture). It sounds stiff and written; in daily speech people prefer ～ないつもりだ or ～ないだろう.
Structure
[Verb dictionary form] + まい (Group 1); [Verb ます-stem] + まい (Group 2/irregular, e.g. 食べまい/すまい/来まい)
Examples
あんな店には二度と行くまい。
Anna mise ni wa nido to iku mai.
I will never go to a shop like that again.
行く + まい expresses a firm negative intention ('I won't go')
彼はもう来まい。
Kare wa mou ko mai.
He probably won't come anymore.
来 (kuru→ko) + まい here is negative conjecture ('surely won't come')
雨は降るまいと思って傘を持たなかった。
Ame wa furu mai to omotte kasa wo motanakatta.
Thinking it surely wouldn't rain, I didn't bring an umbrella.
降る + まい = 'probably won't', used with と思う for a guess
• Register: formal/literary; rare in casual speech. • Group 2 verbs allow both 食べまい and 食べるまい; the ます-stem form is more traditional. • Irregular: する→すまい/しまい, 来る→来(こ)まい/来るまい. • Volition まい is only 1st person; conjecture まい is used for 3rd person or things.
Commonly confused with
The JLPT rarely asks whether you recognise a pattern — it asks which of several similar patterns fits. These are the ones ～まい is tested against.
vs ないつもりだ
まい states negative intent in one stiff word; ～ないつもりだ is the everyday, neutral way to say the same thing.
vs ないだろう
As conjecture, まい means the same as ～ないだろう but is more formal/written and carries stronger conviction.
More modal expressions
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