bis vs by, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#14,300
“bis” frequency rank: #1,598
“by” frequency rank: 15898
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	bis	by
Definition	até	por;

Letter map: bis vs by

Shared letters muted; letters that set bis and by apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch

bis

2 ch

Pair insight - bis / by

bis and by 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 15898, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bis is recorded at frequency rank #14,300, classified as aprep. by is at rank #1,598, tagged as aprep.

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 15898, this pair ranks #55,830 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bis vs by

Shared letters: b. Private to "bis": is. Private to "by": y.

"bis" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "by" · 2 letters · shape CV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "bis" for "by" 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.

Frequency check: "bis" vs "by" - which ranks higher?

"by" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,598 in our Portuguese list, against #14,300 for "bis". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "bis" and "by". Here's where to go from here.

Full dictionary entry for "bis" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "by" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #55,830 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"bis" and "by" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bile vs bis". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #55,830 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.