caisvscaroWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#10,845
“cais” frequency rank
#2,178
“caro” frequency rank
13023
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cais caro
Definition lugar à beira-mar, na margem do rio, nas estações de caminho-de-ferro ou do metropolitano apropriado para o embarque e desembarque de pessoas ou mercadorias cujo preço é elevado

Letter map: cais vs caro

Shared letters muted; letters that set cais and caro apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
cais
4 ch
caro

Grammar separator: cais vs caro

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: cais is anoun and caroanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13023, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cais is recorded at frequency rank #10,845, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈkajʃ/. caro is at rank #2,178, 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 13023, this pair ranks #59,416 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of cais vs caro

Shared letters: ac. Private to "cais": is. Private to "caro": or.

"cais" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "caro" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • caisacis · caiss · casi · ccais · cias
  • caroacro · caor · ccaro · crao

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cais" for "caro" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cais" is a noun and "caro" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "cais" vs "caro" - which ranks higher?
"caro" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,178 in our Portuguese list, against #10,845 for "cais". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "cais" vs "caro" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "caro" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #59,416 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cais" and "caro" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cais vs coin". 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 #59,416 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