Which to use
“cerca” is an adverb and “cerne” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #362
- “cerca” frequency rank
- #22,249
- “cerne” frequency rank
- 22611
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | cerca | cerne |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | perto, nas proximidades, na cercania | parte central do tronco das árvores, que tem funções estruturais |
Letter map: cerca vs cerne
Shared letters muted; letters that set cerca and cerne apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. cerca and cerne follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Role in the sentence - cerca and cerne
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: cerca is anadverb and cerneanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22611, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
cerca is recorded at frequency rank #362, classified as anadv, pronounced /ˈseɾ.kɐ/. cerne is at rank #22,249, tagged as anoun.
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 22611, this pair ranks #47,400 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of cerca vs cerne
Shared letters: cer. Private to "cerca": a. Private to "cerne": n.
"cerca" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "cerne" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "cerca" for "cerne" ever safe?
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "cerca" or "cerne" show up more?
What to do next
Pair "cerca" vs "cerne" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "cerca" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cerne" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #47,400 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "cerca" and "cerne" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cerda vs cerne". 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 #47,400 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.