duquevsduquesaTell them apart

Which to use

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

#7,145
“duque” frequency rank
#19,415
“duquesa” frequency rank
26560
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature duque duquesa
Definition título nobiliárquico do governante de um ducado feminino de duque

Where the eye mixes duque and duquesa

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

5 ch
duque
7 ch
duquesa

Visual trap between duque and duquesa

A purely visual mix-up. duque (/ˈdu.kɨ/) and duquesa (/du.ˈke.zɐ/) 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) - “duque” sits inside “duquesa”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26560, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

duque is recorded at frequency rank #7,145, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈdu.kɨ/. duquesa is at rank #19,415, tagged as anoun, pronounced /du.ˈke.zɐ/.

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 26560, this pair ranks #42,588 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of duque vs duquesa

Shared letters: dequ. Private to "duque": -. Private to "duquesa": as.

"duque" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "duquesa" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • duquedduque · dquue · duqeu · duqque · duuqe · udque
  • duquesadduquesa · dquuesa · duqeusa · duqquesa · duqueas · duquessa · duqusea · duuqesa

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "duque" and "duquesa" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈdu.kɨ/ versus /du.ˈke.zɐ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "duque" or "duquesa"?
"duque" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,145 in our Portuguese list, against #19,415 for "duquesa". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "duque" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "duquesa" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #42,588 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "duque" and "duquesa" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dublê vs duque". 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 #42,588 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