latevslenteWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#12,276
“late” frequency rank
#9,881
“lente” frequency rank
22157
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature late lente
Definition terceira pessoa do presente do indicativo do verbo latir professor universitário

Letter map: late vs lente

Shared letters muted; letters that set late and lente apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. late runs 4 letters (CVCV) against lente's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
late
5 ch
lente

Grammar separator: late vs lente

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: late is averb and lenteanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22157, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

late is recorded at frequency rank #12,276, classified as averb. lente is at rank #9,881, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈlẽ.tɨ/.

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 22157, this pair ranks #47,946 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of late vs lente

Shared letters: elt. Private to "late": a. Private to "lente": n.

"late" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "lente" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • late ← alte · laet · latte · llate · ltae
  • lente ← elnte · lenet · lennte · lentte · letne · llente · lnete

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "late" and "lente" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "late" is a verb and "lente" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "late" or "lente" show up more?
"lente" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,881 in our Portuguese list, against #12,276 for "late". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've compared "late" and "lente". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "late" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lente" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #47,946 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "late" and "lente" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "laca vs late". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #47,946 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