ban

noun

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“ban” is a moderately-common Portuguese word, ranked #13,668 in Portuguese word frequency and used as a noun.

#13,668
frequency rank, Portuguese
3
letters
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - proibição

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

ban vs by
33% similar
ban vs BR
0% similar
ban vs bi
33% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for ban
PropertyValue
Headwordban
LanguagePortuguese
Part of speechNoun
Letters3
Frequency rank#13,668
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “ban” sits in Portuguese frequency

Every-word frequency runs from the handful of words we use constantly (left) to the long tail used once in a blue moon (right). ban lands here:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Scale is logarithmic (each tick is 10× rarer). Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The Portuguese entry for ban is 3 letters long, classified as a noun. Corpus data places it at rank #13,668 in overall Portuguese word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "proibição".

No generated misspelling entries exist for ban in our index, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "by", "BR", "bi", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct Portuguese form is ban, spelled B-A-N.

Definition

  1. 1
    proibição

Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 Portuguese corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "ban"?
"ban" is spelled B-A-N.
What does "ban" mean?
As a noun, "ban" means: proibição
What words are commonly confused with "ban"?
"ban" is commonly confused with "by", "BR", "bi". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
What language does "ban" come from?
"ban" is a Portuguese word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Using “ban”

The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.

  • The one correct Portuguese spelling is B-A-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
  • Don't mix it up with “by” - see the side-by-side comparison. ban vs by
  • Browse more Portuguese words and confusable pairs in the same reference. Portuguese words
Data Source

Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list