qual
/ˈkwaɫ/
The verdict
“qual” is in the everyday core of Portuguese, ranked #125 in Portuguese word frequency and used as a pronoun.
- #125
- frequency rank, Portuguese
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 11
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - quem, que; o pronome qual enfatiza a eleição entre várias possibilidades
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | qual |
| Language | Portuguese |
| Part of speech | Pronoun |
| IPA | /ˈkwaɫ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #125 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 11 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “qual” sits in Portuguese frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The Portuguese entry for qual is 4 letters long, classified as a pronoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈkwaɫ/. Corpus data places it at rank #125 in overall Portuguese word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "quem, que; o pronome qual enfatiza a eleição entre várias possibilidades".
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for qual, with forms such as "qaul", "qqual", and "quall". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 11 confusable-pair relationships, "que", "qui", "quem", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct Portuguese form is qual, spelled Q-U-A-L.
Definition
- 1quem, que; o pronome qual enfatiza a eleição entre várias possibilidades
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: qaul,qqual,quall,qula,uqal
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of qual - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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
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Using “qual”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct Portuguese spelling is Q-U-A-L - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈkwaɫ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “que” - see the side-by-side comparison. qual vs que
- 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.