diesvsdireWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: dies is a noun, dire is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dies” is a noun and “dire” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#34,236
“dies” frequency rank
#27,835
“dire” frequency rank
62071
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dies dire
Definition dia; o dia romano era o período compreendido entre o nascer do sol e o ocaso e divido em 12 horas; nessa acepção (de prazo e no singular) assume o gênero feminino dizer, falar

Letter map: dies vs dire

Shared letters muted; letters that set dies and dire apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. dies (CVVC) and dire (CVCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

4 ch
dies
4 ch
dire

Part-of-speech tell for dies / dire

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: dies is anoun and direaverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62071, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dies is recorded at frequency rank #34,236, classified as anoun. dire is at rank #27,835, tagged as averb, pronounced /diʁ/.

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 62071, this pair ranks #6,843 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of dies vs dire

Shared letters: dei. Private to "dies": s. Private to "dire": r.

"dies" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "dire" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dies ← ddies · deis · diess · ides
  • dire ← ddire · dier · dirre · drie · idre

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "dies" for "dire" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dies" is a noun and "dire" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "dies" or "dire" show up more?
"dire" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #27,835 in our Portuguese list, against #34,236 for "dies". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've compared "dies" and "dire". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dies" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "dire" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #6,843 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dies" and "dire" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dies vs dink". 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 #6,843 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