mãovsmemoWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: mão is a noun, memo is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“mão” is a noun and “memo” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#451
“mão” frequency rank
#35,681
“memo” frequency rank
36132
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mão memo
Definition extremidade do membro anterior dos primatas, capaz de manipular objetos; parte do corpo semelhante ou análoga em outros animais mesmo

Letter map: mão vs memo

Shared letters muted; letters that set mão and memo apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
mão
4 ch
memo

Part-of-speech tell for mão / memo

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: mão is anoun and memoanadverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36132, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mão is recorded at frequency rank #451, classified as anoun, pronounced /mãw/. memo is at rank #35,681, tagged as anadv.

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 36132, this pair ranks #30,747 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of mão vs memo

Shared letters: mo. Private to "mão": ã. Private to "memo": e.

"mão" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "memo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • memoemmo · memmo · meom · mmemo · mmeo

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "mão" and "memo" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mão" is a noun and "memo" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "mão" or "memo"?
"mão" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #451 in our Portuguese list, against #35,681 for "memo". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've compared "mão" and "memo". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mão" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "memo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #30,747 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mão" and "memo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "memo vs muso". 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 #30,747 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