adubovsadultoWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: adubo is a noun, adulto is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“adubo” is a noun and “adulto” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#38,102
“adubo” frequency rank
#3,656
“adulto” frequency rank
41758
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature adubo adulto
Definition estrume diz-se do ser vivo que atingiu a maturidade do desenvolvimento fisiológico, intelectual e/ou emocional (no caso do ser humano, em torno dos vinte anos de idade)

Where the eye mixes adubo and adulto

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. adubo runs 5 letters (VCVCV) against adulto's 6 (VCVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
adubo
6 ch
adulto

Look-alike desk: adubo vs adulto

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: adubo is /ɐ.ˈdu.bu/ while adulto is /a.ˈduw.tu/ ouvir ^(fonte ?). Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41758, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

adubo is recorded at frequency rank #38,102, classified as anoun, pronounced /ɐ.ˈdu.bu/. adulto is at rank #3,656, tagged as anadj, pronounced /a.ˈduw.tu/ ouvir ^(fonte ?).

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 41758, this pair ranks #24,121 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of adubo vs adulto

Shared letters: adou. Private to "adubo": b. Private to "adulto": lt.

"adubo" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV  ·  "adulto" · 6 letters · shape VCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • adubo ← adbuo · addubo · adubbo · aduob · audbo · daubo
  • adulto ← addulto · adluto · adullto · adulot · adultto · adutlo · audlto · daulto

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "adubo" and "adulto" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "adubo" is a noun and "adulto" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "adubo" or "adulto" show up more?
"adulto" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,656 in our Portuguese list, against #38,102 for "adubo". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "adubo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "adulto" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #24,121 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "adubo" and "adulto" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "abo vs adubo". 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 #24,121 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list