ce vs com, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“ce” is a pronoun and “com” is a preposition - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,311
“ce” frequency rank: #14
“com” frequency rank: 3325
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	ce	com
Definition	o que	indica várias relações: companhia, causa, instrumento, ligação, modo, oposição

Where the eye mixes ce and com

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

2 ch

3 ch

com

Why the eye confuses ce with com

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ce is /t͡ʃe/ while com is /kõ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (pronoun vs preposition), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 3325, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ce is recorded at frequency rank #3,311, classified as apron, pronounced /t͡ʃe/. com is at rank #14, tagged as aprep, pronounced /kõ/.

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 3325, this pair ranks #71,839 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ce vs com

Shared letters: c. Private to "ce": e. Private to "com": mo.

"ce" · 2 letters · shape CV · "com" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ce" and "com" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ce" is a pronoun and "com" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "ce" or "com"?

"com" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14 in our Portuguese list, against #3,311 for "ce". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

Full dictionary entry for "ce" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "com" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #71,839 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"ce" and "com" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cham vs com". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #71,839 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.