levevsliseTell them apart

Quick tell: leve is a adjective, lise is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“leve” is an adjective and “lise” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,245
“leve” frequency rank
#39,238
“lise” frequency rank
40483
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature leve lise
Definition que tem pouco peso redução gradativa do estado febril e de seus sintomas

Where the eye mixes leve and lise

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. leve and lise follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
leve
4 ch
lise

Look-alike desk: leve vs lise

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: leve is /ˈlɛ.vɨ/ while lise is /ˈli.zi/. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40483, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

leve is recorded at frequency rank #1,245, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈlɛ.vɨ/. lise is at rank #39,238, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈli.zi/.

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 40483, this pair ranks #25,618 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of leve vs lise

Shared letters: el. Private to "leve": v. Private to "lise": is.

"leve" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "lise" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • leve ← elve · leev · levve · lleve · lvee
  • lise ← ilse · lies · lisse · llise · lsie

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "leve" for "lise" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "leve" is an adjective and "lise" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "leve" vs "lise" - which ranks higher?
"leve" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,245 in our Portuguese list, against #39,238 for "lise". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "leve" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lise" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #25,618 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "leve" and "lise" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Lied vs lise". 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 #25,618 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