lincevsliseWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#40,653
“lince” frequency rank
#39,238
“lise” frequency rank
79891
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lince lise
Definition designação comum a três espécies de mamíferos do gênero Felis, da família dos felídeos, com cauda curta ou muito curta e tufos de pelos nas orelhas redução gradativa do estado febril e de seus sintomas

Where the eye mixes lince and lise

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. lince runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against lise's 4 (CVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
lince
4 ch
lise

Look-alike desk: lince vs lise

A purely visual mix-up. lince (/ˈlĩ.sɨ/) and lise (/ˈli.zi/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 79891, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lince is recorded at frequency rank #40,653, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈlĩ.sɨ/. 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 79891, this pair ranks #1,425 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of lince vs lise

Shared letters: eil. Private to "lince": cn. Private to "lise": s.

"lince" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "lise" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lince ← ilnce · licne · lincce · linec · linnce · llince · lnice
  • lise ← ilse · lies · lisse · llise · lsie

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "lince" for "lise" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/ˈlĩ.sɨ/ versus /ˈli.zi/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "lince" vs "lise" - which ranks higher?
"lise" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #39,238 in our Portuguese list, against #40,653 for "lince". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "lince" 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 #1,425 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "lince" 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 #1,425 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