grau vs grave, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#2,014
“grau” frequency rank: #2,096
“grave” frequency rank: 4110
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	grau	grave
Definition	unidade de ângulo	som de baixa frequência, no limite inferior da audição humana

Letter map: grau vs grave

Shared letters muted; letters that set grau and grave apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

4 ch

grau

5 ch

grave

Grammar separator: grau vs grave

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: grau is anoun and graveanadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4110, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

grau is recorded at frequency rank #2,014, classified as anoun. grave is at rank #2,096, tagged as anadj.

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 4110, this pair ranks #70,897 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of grau vs grave

Shared letters: agr. Private to "grau": u. Private to "grave": ev.

"grau" · 4 letters · shape CCVV · "grave" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

grau ← garu · ggrau · grrau · rgau
grave ← garve · ggrave · graev · gravve · grrave · grvae · rgave

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "grau" for "grave" ever safe?

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

Which is more common, "grau" or "grave"?

"grau" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,014 in our Portuguese list, against #2,096 for "grave". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "grau" and "grave".

Full dictionary entry for "grau" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "grave" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #70,897 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"grau" and "grave" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "grau vs grip". 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 #70,897 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.