Which to use
“borrão” and “burra” are a confusable Portuguese pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #48,282
- “borrão” frequency rank
- #12,384
- “burra” frequency rank
- 60666
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | borrão | burra |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | sujidade | engenho para tirar água de um poço |
Where the eye mixes borrão and burra
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. borrão runs 6 letters (CVCCVV) against burra's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between borrão and burra
A purely visual mix-up. borrão (/bu.ˈRɐ̃w̃/) and burra (/ˈbu.xɐ/) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60666, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
borrão is recorded at frequency rank #48,282, classified as anoun, pronounced /bu.ˈRɐ̃w̃/. burra is at rank #12,384, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈbu.xɐ/.
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 60666, this pair ranks #7,530 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of borrão vs burra
Shared letters: br. Private to "borrão": oã. Private to "burra": au.
"borrão" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV · "burra" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- burra ← bburra · brura · bura · burar · ubrra
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "borrão" and "burra" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "borrão" or "burra"?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "borrão" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "burra" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #7,530 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "borrão" and "burra" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "borrão vs borrego". 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 #7,530 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.