afãvsaltaWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#47,702
“afã” frequency rank
#818
“alta” frequency rank
48520
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature afã alta
Definition azáfama; ânsia; lida: alto, elevado

Where the eye mixes afã and alta

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence. afã runs 3 letters (VCV) against alta's 4 (VCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
afã
4 ch
alta

Look-alike desk: afã vs alta

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: afã is /ɐ.ˈfɐ̃/ while alta is /ˈal.ta/.. 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 48520, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

afã is recorded at frequency rank #47,702, classified as anoun, pronounced /ɐ.ˈfɐ̃/. alta is at rank #818, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈal.ta/..

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 48520, this pair ranks #16,646 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of afã vs alta

Shared letters: a. Private to "afã": fã. Private to "alta": lt.

"afã" · 3 letters · shape VCV  ·  "alta" · 4 letters · shape VCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • alta ← alat · allta · altta · atla

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "afã" for "alta" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "afã" is a noun and "alta" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "afã" or "alta"?
"alta" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #818 in our Portuguese list, against #47,702 for "afã". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "afã" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "alta" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #16,646 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "afã" and "alta" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "acs vs afã". 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 #16,646 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