cevscuteWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: ce is a pronoun, cute is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#3,311
“ce” frequency rank
#34,217
“cute” frequency rank
37528
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ce cute
Definition o que que tem característica bonita, que agrada, que causa de encantamento

Where the eye mixes ce and cute

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

2 ch
ce
4 ch
cute

Visual trap between ce and cute

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ce is /t͡ʃe/ while cute is /ˈku.ʧi/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (pronoun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37528, 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/. cute is at rank #34,217, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈku.ʧi/.

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 37528, this pair ranks #29,074 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ce vs cute

Shared letters: ce. Private to "ce": -. Private to "cute": tu.

"ce" · 2 letters · shape CV  ·  "cute" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cuteccute · ctue · cuet · cutte · ucte

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ce" for "cute" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ce" is a pronoun and "cute" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "ce" or "cute" show up more?
"ce" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,311 in our Portuguese list, against #34,217 for "cute". 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 "cute" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #29,074 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ce" and "cute" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "chuto vs cute". 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 #29,074 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