debatevsdecadeTell them apart

Which to use

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

#2,270
“debate” frequency rank
#42,866
“decade” frequency rank
45136
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature debate decade
Definition discussão década

Letter map: debate vs decade

Shared letters muted; letters that set debate and decade apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

6 ch
debate
6 ch
decade

Pair insight - debate / decade

debate and decade 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 share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45136, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

debate is recorded at frequency rank #2,270, classified as anoun, pronounced /dɨ.ˈba.tɨ/. decade is at rank #42,866, 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 45136, this pair ranks #20,284 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of debate vs decade

Shared letters: ade. Private to "debate": bt. Private to "decade": c.

"debate" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "decade" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • debatedbeate · ddebate · deabte · debaet · debatte · debbate · debtae · edbate
  • decadedceade · ddecade · deacde · decadde · decaed · deccade · decdae · edcade

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "debate" and "decade" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Which is more common, "debate" or "decade"?
"debate" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,270 in our Portuguese list, against #42,866 for "decade". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "debate" and "decade".

  • Full dictionary entry for "debate" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "decade" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #20,284 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "debate" and "decade" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "decade vs declare". 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 #20,284 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