contavscortaWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#223
“conta” frequency rank
#4,545
“corta” frequency rank
4768
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature conta corta
Definition qualquer operação de aritmética ato de cortar

Letter map: conta vs corta

Shared letters muted; letters that set conta and corta apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

5 ch
conta
5 ch
corta

Pair insight - conta / corta

conta and corta are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by a single letter - n in “conta” becomes r in “corta”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4768, 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/. corta is at rank #4,545, 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 4768, this pair ranks #70,025 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of conta vs corta

Shared letters: acot. Private to "conta": n. Private to "corta": r.

"conta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "corta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • contacconta · cnota · conat · connta · contta · cotna · ocnta
  • cortaccorta · corat · corrta · cortta · cotra · crota · ocrta

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "conta" and "corta" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They differ by a single letter - n in “conta” becomes r in “corta”, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "conta" or "corta" show up more?
"conta" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #223 in our Portuguese list, against #4,545 for "corta". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've compared "conta" and "corta". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "conta" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "corta" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #70,025 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "conta" and "corta" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cerda vs corta". 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 #70,025 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