arãovsatrasoTell them apart

Which to use

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

#30,004
“arão” frequency rank
#4,206
“atraso” frequency rank
34210
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature arão atraso
Definition ave marinha, airo, também chamado arau-comum, Uria aalge ato ou efeito de atrasar(-se)

Where the eye mixes arão and atraso

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. arão runs 4 letters (VCVV) against atraso's 6 (VCCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
arão
6 ch
atraso

Visual trap between arão and atraso

A purely visual mix-up. arão (Singular: /ɐ.'ɾaŋ/, /ɐ.'ɾa.o/, /ɐ.'ɾaw/) and atraso (/ɐ.ˈtɾa.zu/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 34210, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

arão is recorded at frequency rank #30,004, classified as anoun, pronounced Singular: /ɐ.'ɾaŋ/, /ɐ.'ɾa.o/, /ɐ.'ɾaw/. atraso is at rank #4,206, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ɐ.ˈtɾa.zu/.

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 34210, this pair ranks #33,116 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of arão vs atraso

Shared letters: aor. Private to "arão": ã. Private to "atraso": st.

"arão" · 4 letters · shape VCVV  ·  "atraso" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • atrasoartaso · atarso · atraos · atrasso · atrraso · atrsao · attraso · taraso

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "arão" and "atraso" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (Singular: /ɐ.'ɾaŋ/, /ɐ.'ɾa.o/, /ɐ.'ɾaw/ versus /ɐ.ˈtɾa.zu/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "arão" or "atraso" show up more?
"atraso" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,206 in our Portuguese list, against #30,004 for "arão". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "arão" and "atraso" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "arão" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "atraso" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #33,116 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "arão" and "atraso" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "arão vs atar". 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 #33,116 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