amavsanjaWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“ama” and “anja” are a confusable Portuguese pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#1,454
“ama” frequency rank
#39,972
“anja” frequency rank
41426
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ama anja
Definition mulher que amamenta filho alheio ser espiritual manifesto com forma feminina

Letter map: ama vs anja

Shared letters muted; letters that set ama and anja apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
ama
4 ch
anja

Pair insight - ama / anja

ama and anja are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41426, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ama is recorded at frequency rank #1,454, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈɐ.mɐ/. anja is at rank #39,972, tagged as anoun.

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 41426, this pair ranks #24,489 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ama vs anja

Shared letters: a. Private to "ama": m. Private to "anja": jn.

"ama" · 3 letters · shape VCV  ·  "anja" · 4 letters · shape VCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • anjaajna · anaj · anjja · annja · naja

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ama" for "anja" ever safe?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "ama" or "anja" show up more?
"ama" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,454 in our Portuguese list, against #39,972 for "anja". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "ama" and "anja".

  • Full dictionary entry for "ama" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "anja" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #24,489 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ama" and "anja" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "afã vs anja". 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 #24,489 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