job vs joy, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#13,776
“job” frequency rank: #10,741
“joy” frequency rank: 24517
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	job	joy
Definition	trabalho	alegria

Letter map: job vs joy

Shared letters muted; letters that set job and joy apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch

job

3 ch

joy

Corpus notes: job and joy

job and joy are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by a single letter - b in “job” becomes y in “joy”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24517, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

job is recorded at frequency rank #13,776, classified as anoun. joy is at rank #10,741, tagged as anoun, pronounced /dʒɔɪ/.

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 24517, this pair ranks #45,078 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of job vs joy

Shared letters: jo. Private to "job": b. Private to "joy": y.

"job" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "joy" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "job" and "joy" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No. They differ by a single letter - b in “job” becomes y in “joy”, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.

In ordinary Portuguese text, does "job" or "joy" show up more?

"joy" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,741 in our Portuguese list, against #13,776 for "job". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "job" and "joy". Here's where to go from here.

Full dictionary entry for "job" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "joy" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #45,078 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"job" and "joy" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "jed vs job". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #45,078 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.