ic vs iu, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“ic” is a pronoun and “iu” is an abbrev - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#25,339
“ic” frequency rank: #42,065
“iu” frequency rank: 67404
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	ic	iu
Definition	eu, pronome pessoal do caso reto da primeira pessoa do singular	código de língua ISO 639-3 para a macrolíngua esquimó/inuktitut

Where the eye mixes ic and iu

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

2 ch

Look-alike desk: ic vs iu

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ic is /iʧ/ while iu is /ˈi.u/, /ˈi.ʊ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - c in “ic” becomes u in “iu”, and the parts of speech differ too (pronoun vs abbrev), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67404, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ic is recorded at frequency rank #25,339, classified as apron, pronounced /iʧ/. iu is at rank #42,065, tagged as anabbrev, pronounced /ˈi.u/, /ˈi.ʊ/.

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 67404, this pair ranks #4,630 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ic vs iu

Shared letters: i. Private to "ic": c. Private to "iu": u.

"ic" · 2 letters · shape VC · "iu" · 2 letters · shape VV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ic" and "iu" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ic" is a pronoun and "iu" an abbrev, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Frequency check: "ic" vs "iu" - which ranks higher?

"ic" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #25,339 in our Portuguese list, against #42,065 for "iu". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

Full dictionary entry for "ic" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "iu" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #4,630 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"ic" and "iu" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ino vs iu". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #4,630 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.