harpavshastaWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#30,188
“harpa” frequency rank
#23,681
“hasta” frequency rank
53869
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature harpa hasta
Definition instrumento musical de cordas triangular lança

Where the eye mixes harpa and hasta

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. harpa and hasta follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
harpa
5 ch
hasta

Look-alike desk: harpa vs hasta

A purely visual mix-up. harpa (/ˈaɾ.pɐ/) and hasta (/ˈaʃ.tɐ/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53869, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

harpa is recorded at frequency rank #30,188, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈaɾ.pɐ/. hasta is at rank #23,681, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈaʃ.tɐ/.

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 53869, this pair ranks #11,718 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of harpa vs hasta

Shared letters: ah. Private to "harpa": pr. Private to "hasta": st.

"harpa" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "hasta" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • harpa ← ahrpa · hapra · harap · harppa · harrpa · hharpa · hrapa
  • hasta ← ahsta · hasat · hassta · hastta · hatsa · hhasta · hsata

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "harpa" and "hasta" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈaɾ.pɐ/ versus /ˈaʃ.tɐ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "harpa" or "hasta"?
"hasta" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,681 in our Portuguese list, against #30,188 for "harpa". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "harpa" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hasta" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #11,718 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "harpa" and "hasta" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hamza vs harpa". 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 #11,718 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