imivsíonWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#47,938
“imi” frequency rank
#44,174
“íon” frequency rank
92112
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature imi íon
Definition terceira pessoa do singular do passado do indicativo do verbo imeä: espécie química eletricamente carregada, geralmente um átomo ou molécula que perdeu ou ganhou elétrons

Letter map: imi vs íon

Shared letters muted; letters that set imi and íon apart highlighted. No shared letter run.

3 ch
imi
3 ch
íon

Part-of-speech tell for imi / íon

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: imi is averb and íonanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 92112, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

imi is recorded at frequency rank #47,938, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈi.mi/. íon is at rank #44,174, tagged as anoun.

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 92112, this pair ranks #174 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of imi vs íon

Shared letters: none. Private to "imi": im. Private to "íon": noí.

"imi" · 3 letters · shape VCV  ·  "íon" · 3 letters · shape VVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "imi" for "íon" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "imi" is a verb and "íon" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "imi" or "íon"?
"íon" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #44,174 in our Portuguese list, against #47,938 for "imi". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "imi" and "íon". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "imi" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "íon" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #174 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "imi" and "íon" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "imi vs ino". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #174 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