exemplar vs exemplo, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“exemplar” is an adjective and “exemplo” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#8,619
“exemplar” frequency rank: #334
“exemplo” frequency rank: 8953
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	exemplar	exemplo
Definition	que serve ou pode servir de exemplo	descrição de um caso particular que ilustra e facilita o entendimento de uma regra geral

Letter map: exemplar vs exemplo

Shared letters muted; letters that set exemplar and exemplo apart highlighted. Shared run: 6. exemplar runs 8 letters (VCVCCCVC) against exemplo's 7 (VCVCCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch

exemplar

7 ch

exemplo

Role in the sentence - exemplar and exemplo

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: exemplar is anadjective and exemploanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8953, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

exemplar is recorded at frequency rank #8,619, classified as anadj, pronounced /e.zẽˈpla(ʁ)/. exemplo is at rank #334, 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 8953, this pair ranks #64,641 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of exemplar vs exemplo

Shared letters: elmpx. Private to "exemplar": ar. Private to "exemplo": o.

"exemplar" · 8 letters · shape VCVCCCVC · "exemplo" · 7 letters · shape VCVCCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

exemplar ← eexmplar · exemlpar · exemmplar · exempalr · exemplarr · exempllar · exemplra · exempplar
exemplo ← eexmplo · exemlpo · exemmplo · exempllo · exempol · exempplo · exepmlo · exmeplo

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "exemplar" for "exemplo" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "exemplar" is an adjective and "exemplo" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary Portuguese text, does "exemplar" or "exemplo" show up more?

"exemplo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #334 in our Portuguese list, against #8,619 for "exemplar". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Pair "exemplar" vs "exemplo" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

Full dictionary entry for "exemplar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "exemplo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #64,641 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
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 #64,641 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.