câmaravscaraWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: câmara is a noun, cara is a preposition, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“câmara” is a noun and “cara” is a preposition - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#756
“câmara” frequency rank
#195
“cara” frequency rank
951
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature câmara cara
Definition quarto de dormir em direção a, para, contra

Letter map: câmara vs cara

Shared letters muted; letters that set câmara and cara apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. câmara runs 6 letters (CVCVCV) against cara's 4 (CVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
câmara
4 ch
cara

Grammar separator: câmara vs cara

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: câmara is anoun and caraapreposition. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 951, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

câmara is recorded at frequency rank #756, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈkɐ.mɐ.ɾɐ/. cara is at rank #195, 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 951, this pair ranks #74,679 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of câmara vs cara

Shared letters: acr. Private to "câmara": mâ. Private to "cara": -.

"câmara" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "cara" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cara ← acra · caar · carra · ccara · craa

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "câmara" and "cara" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "câmara" is a noun and "cara" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "câmara" or "cara" show up more?
"cara" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #195 in our Portuguese list, against #756 for "câmara". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "câmara" and "cara". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "câmara" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cara" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #74,679 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "câmara" and "cara" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cara vs cerda". 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 #74,679 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