falirvsfelizWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: falir is a verb, feliz is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“falir” is a verb and “feliz” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#27,479
“falir” frequency rank
#406
“feliz” frequency rank
27885
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature falir feliz
Definition ir à falência, não ter como cumprir com suas obrigações financeiras que sente ou transmite felicidade

Letter map: falir vs feliz

Shared letters muted; letters that set falir and feliz apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch
falir
5 ch
feliz

Part-of-speech tell for falir / feliz

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: falir is averb and felizanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 27885, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

falir is recorded at frequency rank #27,479, classified as averb. feliz is at rank #406, tagged as anadj, pronounced /fe'lis/.

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 27885, this pair ranks #41,032 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of falir vs feliz

Shared letters: fil. Private to "falir": ar. Private to "feliz": ez.

"falir" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "feliz" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • faliraflir · failr · falirr · fallir · falri · ffalir · flair
  • felizefliz · feilz · felizz · felliz · felzi · ffeliz · fleiz

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "falir" and "feliz" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "falir" is a verb and "feliz" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "falir" or "feliz"?
"feliz" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #406 in our Portuguese list, against #27,479 for "falir". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've compared "falir" and "feliz". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "falir" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "feliz" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #41,032 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "falir" and "feliz" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "faia vs falir". 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 #41,032 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