medidavsmedirTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#1,014
“medida” frequency rank
#7,434
“medir” frequency rank
8448
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature medida medir
Definition determinada grandeza que serve de padrão para avaliar outra ter como medida

Where the eye mixes medida and medir

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
medida
5 ch
medir

Look-alike desk: medida vs medir

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: medida is /mɨ.ˈdi.dɐ/ while medir is /mɨ.ˈdiɾ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8448, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

medida is recorded at frequency rank #1,014, classified as anoun, pronounced /mɨ.ˈdi.dɐ/. medir is at rank #7,434, tagged as averb, pronounced /mɨ.ˈdiɾ/.

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 8448, this pair ranks #65,323 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of medida vs medir

Shared letters: deim. Private to "medida": a. Private to "medir": r.

"medida" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "medir" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • medidaemdida · mdeida · meddia · meddida · mediad · medidda · meidda · mmedida
  • mediremdir · mdeir · meddir · medirr · medri · meidr · mmedir

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "medida" for "medir" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "medida" is a noun and "medir" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "medida" or "medir" show up more?
"medida" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,014 in our Portuguese list, against #7,434 for "medir". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "medida" and "medir" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "medida" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "medir" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #65,323 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "medida" and "medir" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "medir vs mein". 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 #65,323 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