memo vs memory, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#35,681
“memo” frequency rank: #22,722
“memory” frequency rank: 58403
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	memo	memory
Definition	mesmo	memória

Letter map: memo vs memory

Shared letters muted; letters that set memo and memory apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

4 ch

memo

6 ch

memory

Role in the sentence - memo and memory

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: memo is anadverb and memoryanoun. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “memo” sits inside “memory”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58403, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

memo is recorded at frequency rank #35,681, classified as anadv. memory is at rank #22,722, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈmɛməɹi/.

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 58403, this pair ranks #8,759 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of memo vs memory

Shared letters: emo. Private to "memo": -. Private to "memory": ry.

"memo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "memory" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

memo ← emmo · memmo · meom · mmemo · mmeo
memory ← emmory · memmory · memorry · memoryy · memoyr · memroy · meomry · mmemory

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "memo" for "memory" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "memo" is an adverb and "memory" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary Portuguese text, does "memo" or "memory" show up more?

"memory" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22,722 in our Portuguese list, against #35,681 for "memo". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "memo" and "memory".

Full dictionary entry for "memo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "memory" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #8,759 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"memo" and "memory" 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 #8,759 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.