bordãovsbordoConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#30,857
“bordão” frequency rank
#3,456
“bordo” frequency rank
34313
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bordão bordo
Definition vara de apoio cada um dos lados de um navio

Letter map: bordão vs bordo

Shared letters muted; letters that set bordão and bordo apart highlighted. Shared run: 5. bordão runs 6 letters (CVCCVV) against bordo's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
bordão
5 ch
bordo

Spelling & dictionary notes on bordão vs bordo

bordão and bordo 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 34313, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bordão is recorded at frequency rank #30,857, classified as anoun. bordo is at rank #3,456, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈbɔɾ.du/.

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 34313, this pair ranks #32,989 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bordão vs bordo

Shared letters: bdor. Private to "bordão": ã. Private to "bordo": -.

"bordão" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "bordo" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bordo ← bbordo · bodro · borddo · borod · borrdo · brodo · obrdo

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "bordão" for "bordo" 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: "bordão" vs "bordo" - which ranks higher?
"bordo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,456 in our Portuguese list, against #30,857 for "bordão". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "bordão" and "bordo".

  • Full dictionary entry for "bordão" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "bordo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #32,989 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bordão" and "bordo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bordão vs borrão". 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 #32,989 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