bastavsbestaWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: basta is a intj, besta is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“basta” is an intj and “besta” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,234
“basta” frequency rank
#6,378
“besta” frequency rank
7612
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature basta besta
Definition não mais!; chega! diz-se de uma pessoa abobalhada ou ingênua

Letter map: basta vs besta

Shared letters muted; letters that set basta and besta apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. basta and besta follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
basta
5 ch
besta

Role in the sentence - basta and besta

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: basta is anintj and bestaanadjective. On the page they differ by a single letter - a in “basta” becomes e in “besta”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7612, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

basta is recorded at frequency rank #1,234, classified as anintj, pronounced /ˈbaʃ.tɐ/. besta is at rank #6,378, tagged as anadj.

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 7612, this pair ranks #66,499 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of basta vs besta

Shared letters: abst. Private to "basta": -. Private to "besta": e.

"basta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "besta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • basta ← absta · basat · bassta · bastta · batsa · bbasta · bsata
  • besta ← bbesta · besat · bessta · bestta · betsa · bseta · ebsta

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "basta" and "besta" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "basta" is an intj and "besta" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "basta" or "besta"?
"basta" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,234 in our Portuguese list, against #6,378 for "besta". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "basta" and "besta". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "basta" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "besta" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #66,499 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "basta" and "besta" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "beata vs besta". 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 #66,499 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