idovsimiConfusable pair

Quick tell: ido is a noun, imi is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“ido” is a noun and “imi” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,480
“ido” frequency rank
#47,938
“imi” frequency rank
51418
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ido imi
Definition língua artificial, uma versão simplificada do esperanto; não é adotada oficialmente por nenhum país e é seguida por grupos pequenos de pessoas, especialmente na Europa terceira pessoa do singular do passado do indicativo do verbo imeä:

Where the eye mixes ido and imi

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

3 ch
ido
3 ch
imi

Visual trap between ido and imi

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ido is /ˈi.du/ while imi is /ˈi.mi/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 51418, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ido is recorded at frequency rank #3,480, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈi.du/. imi is at rank #47,938, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈi.mi/.

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 51418, this pair ranks #13,623 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ido vs imi

Shared letters: i. Private to "ido": do. Private to "imi": m.

"ido" · 3 letters · shape VCV  ·  "imi" · 3 letters · shape VCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ido" for "imi" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ido" is a noun and "imi" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "ido" or "imi" show up more?
"ido" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,480 in our Portuguese list, against #47,938 for "imi". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "ido" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "imi" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #13,623 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ido" and "imi" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "imi vs ino". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #13,623 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