deathvsdestaConfusable pair

Quick tell: death is a noun, desta is a contraction, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“death” is a noun and “desta” is a contraction - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#7,267
“death” frequency rank
#364
“desta” frequency rank
7631
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature death desta
Definition morte contração da preposição de com o pronome ou determinante demonstrativo esta

Where the eye mixes death and desta

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
death
5 ch
desta

Look-alike desk: death vs desta

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: death is /dɛθ/ while desta is /ˈdɛʃ.tɐ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs contraction), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7631, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

death is recorded at frequency rank #7,267, classified as anoun, pronounced /dɛθ/. desta is at rank #364, tagged as acontraction, pronounced /ˈdɛʃ.tɐ/.

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 7631, this pair ranks #66,472 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of death vs desta

Shared letters: adet. Private to "death": h. Private to "desta": s.

"death" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "desta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • deathdaeth · ddeath · deaht · deathh · deatth · detah · edath
  • destaddesta · desat · dessta · destta · detsa · dseta · edsta

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "death" and "desta" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "death" is a noun and "desta" a contraction, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "death" vs "desta" - which ranks higher?
"desta" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #364 in our Portuguese list, against #7,267 for "death". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "death" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "desta" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #66,472 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "death" and "desta" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dat vs death". 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 #66,472 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