fomevsfoqueWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#1,047
“fome” frequency rank
#34,289
“foque” frequency rank
35336
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature fome foque
Definition necessidade de comer ou grande apetite; sofreguidão vela triangular colocada à frente do mastro principal, geralmente içada no estai de proa

Letter map: fome vs foque

Shared letters muted; letters that set fome and foque apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

4 ch
fome
5 ch
foque

Corpus notes: fome and foque

fome and foque are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 35336, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

fome is recorded at frequency rank #1,047, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈfɔ.mɨ/. foque is at rank #34,289, 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 35336, this pair ranks #31,716 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of fome vs foque

Shared letters: efo. Private to "fome": m. Private to "foque": qu.

"fome" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "foque" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • fomeffome · fmoe · foem · fomme · ofme
  • foqueffoque · foqeu · foqque · fouqe · fqoue · ofque

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "fome" and "foque" be used interchangeably?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "fome" vs "foque" - which ranks higher?
"fome" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,047 in our Portuguese list, against #34,289 for "foque". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "fome" and "foque".

  • Full dictionary entry for "fome" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "foque" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #31,716 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "fome" and "foque" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fome vs former". 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 #31,716 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