irvsírisWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#162
“ir” frequency rank
#7,993
“íris” frequency rank
8155
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ir íris
Definition mover-se de um lugar para outro meteoro luminoso produzido na atmosfera em forma de arco pela decomposição dos raios solares

Letter map: ir vs íris

Shared letters muted; letters that set ir and íris apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

2 ch
ir
4 ch
íris

Part-of-speech tell for ir / íris

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: ir is averb and írisanoun. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8155, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ir is recorded at frequency rank #162, classified as averb. íris is at rank #7,993, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈi.ɾiʃ/.

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 8155, this pair ranks #65,733 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ir vs íris

Shared letters: ir. Private to "ir": -. Private to "íris": .

"ir" · 2 letters · shape VC  ·  "íris" · 4 letters · shape VCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ir" and "íris" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ir" is a verb and "íris" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "ir" vs "íris" - which ranks higher?
"ir" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #162 in our Portuguese list, against #7,993 for "íris". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pair "ir" vs "íris" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ir" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "íris" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #65,733 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ir" and "íris" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ioiô vs íris". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #65,733 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