patvspotoTell them apart

Which to use

“pat” and “poto” are a confusable Spanish pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#14,422
“pat” frequency rank
#45,517
“poto” frequency rank
59939
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pat poto
Definition Cazón. Conjunto de la musculatura de la parte anterior de la cadera.

Where the eye mixes pat and poto

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

3 ch
pat
4 ch
poto

Why the eye confuses pat with poto

A purely visual mix-up. pat (/pat/) and poto ([ˈpot̪o]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59939, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pat is recorded at frequency rank #14,422, classified as anoun, pronounced /pat/. poto is at rank #45,517, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈpot̪o].

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 59939, this pair ranks #60,766 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pat vs poto

Shared letters: pt. Private to "pat": a. Private to "poto": o.

"pat" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "poto" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • potoopto · poot · potto · ppoto · ptoo

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "pat" for "poto" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/pat/ versus [ˈpot̪o]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "pat" or "poto"?
"pat" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,422 in our Spanish list, against #45,517 for "poto". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "pat" and "poto" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pat" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "poto" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #60,766 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pat" and "poto" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "poto vs probo". 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

Confusion rank #60,766 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list