bodavsbomWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: boda is a noun, bom is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“boda” is a noun and “bom” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#44,721
“boda” frequency rank
#96
“bom” frequency rank
44817
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature boda bom
Definition celebração de um casamento que corresponde plenamente ao que é exigido, desejado ou esperado quanto à sua natureza, adequação, função, eficácia, funcionamento etc. (falando de ser ou coisa)

Letter map: boda vs bom

Shared letters muted; letters that set boda and bom apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
boda
3 ch
bom

Part-of-speech tell for boda / bom

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: boda is anoun and bomanadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44817, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

boda is recorded at frequency rank #44,721, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈbo.dɐ/. bom is at rank #96, 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 44817, this pair ranks #20,603 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of boda vs bom

Shared letters: bo. Private to "boda": ad. Private to "bom": m.

"boda" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "bom" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bodabboda · bdoa · boad · bodda · obda

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "boda" and "bom" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "boda" is a noun and "bom" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "boda" vs "bom" - which ranks higher?
"bom" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #96 in our Portuguese list, against #44,721 for "boda". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've compared "boda" and "bom". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "boda" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "bom" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #20,603 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "boda" and "bom" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "baga vs boda". 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 #20,603 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