Which to use
“altar” is a noun and “alter” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #8,141
- “altar” frequency rank
- #23,189
- “alter” frequency rank
- 31330
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | altar | alter |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | estrutura elevada perante a qual cerimônias religiosas são realizadas ou na qual sacrifícios podem ser oferecidos aos deuses, ancestrais, etc | outro (dentre dois) |
Letter map: altar vs alter
Shared letters muted; letters that set altar and alter apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.
Part-of-speech tell for altar / alter
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: altar is anoun and alterapronoun. On the page they differ by a single letter - a in “altar” becomes e in “alter”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 31330, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
altar is recorded at frequency rank #8,141, classified as anoun. alter is at rank #23,189, tagged as apron.
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 31330, this pair ranks #36,799 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of altar vs alter
Shared letters: alrt. Private to "altar": -. Private to "alter": e.
"altar" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC · "alter" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "altar" for "alter" ever safe?
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "altar" or "alter" show up more?
After this comparison
Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "altar" and "alter".
- Full dictionary entry for "altar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "alter" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #36,799 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "altar" and "alter" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "alles vs alter". 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 #36,799 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.