evselWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: e is a conjunction, el is an article, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“e” is a conjunction and “el” is an article - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#5
“e” frequency rank
#1,143
“el” frequency rank
1148
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature e el
Definition usado para unir orações ou termos de mesma natureza gramatical o, artigo definido masculino:

Letter map: e vs el

Shared letters muted; letters that set e and el apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

1 ch
e
2 ch
el

Grammar separator: e vs el

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: e is aconjunction and elanarticle. On the page they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “e” sits inside “el”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1148, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

e is recorded at frequency rank #5, classified as aconj, pronounced /i/. el is at rank #1,143, tagged as anarticle.

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 1148, this pair ranks #74,466 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of e vs el

Shared letters: e. Private to "e": -. Private to "el": l.

"e" · 1 letters · shape V  ·  "el" · 2 letters · shape VC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "e" and "el" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "e" is a conjunction and "el" an article, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "e" or "el"?
"e" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5 in our Portuguese list, against #1,143 for "el". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

You've compared "e" and "el". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "e" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "el" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #74,466 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "e" and "el" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "el vs elio". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #74,466 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