hamvshomoTell them apart

Which to use

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

#19,746
“ham” frequency rank
#16,307
“homo” frequency rank
36053
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ham homo
Definition pernil homem, indivíduo da espécie humana

Where the eye mixes ham and homo

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

3 ch
ham
4 ch
homo

Visual trap between ham and homo

A purely visual mix-up. ham (/hæm/) and homo (/ˈhɔ.mo/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36053, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ham is recorded at frequency rank #19,746, classified as anoun, pronounced /hæm/. homo is at rank #16,307, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈhɔ.mo/.

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 36053, this pair ranks #30,845 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ham vs homo

Shared letters: hm. Private to "ham": a. Private to "homo": o.

"ham" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "homo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • homohhomo · hmoo · hommo · hoom · ohmo

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ham" and "homo" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/hæm/ versus /ˈhɔ.mo/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "ham" or "homo"?
"homo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,307 in our Portuguese list, against #19,746 for "ham". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "ham" and "homo" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ham" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "homo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #30,845 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ham" and "homo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ham vs hamza". 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 #30,845 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