contavscontactWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“conta” and “contact” are a confusable Portuguese pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#223
“conta” frequency rank
#19,663
“contact” frequency rank
19886
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature conta contact
Definition qualquer operação de aritmética contato; contacto

Where the eye mixes conta and contact

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. conta runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against contact's 7 (CVCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
conta
7 ch
contact

Look-alike desk: conta vs contact

A purely visual mix-up. conta (/ˈkõ.tɐ/) and contact (/kɔ̃takt/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “conta” sits inside “contact”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19886, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

conta is recorded at frequency rank #223, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈkõ.tɐ/. contact is at rank #19,663, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɔ̃takt/.

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 19886, this pair ranks #50,749 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of conta vs contact

Shared letters: acnot. Private to "conta": -. Private to "contact": -.

"conta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "contact" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • conta ← cconta · cnota · conat · connta · contta · cotna · ocnta
  • contact ← ccontact · cnotact · conatct · conntact · contacct · contactt · contatc · contcat

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "conta" and "contact" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈkõ.tɐ/ versus /kɔ̃takt/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "conta" or "contact"?
"conta" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #223 in our Portuguese list, against #19,663 for "contact". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "conta" and "contact" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "conta" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "contact" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #50,749 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "conta" and "contact" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "contact vs contest". 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 #50,749 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