memo vs mesmo, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#35,681
“memo” frequency rank: #56
“mesmo” frequency rank: 35737
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	memo	mesmo
Definition	mesmo	que tem igualdade de caráter

Letter map: memo vs mesmo

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

4 ch

memo

5 ch

mesmo

Grammar separator: memo vs mesmo

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: memo is anadverb and mesmoanadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 35737, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

memo is recorded at frequency rank #35,681, classified as anadv. mesmo is at rank #56, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈmeʒ.mu/.

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 35737, this pair ranks #31,265 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of memo vs mesmo

Shared letters: emo. Private to "memo": -. Private to "mesmo": s.

"memo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "mesmo" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

memo ← emmo · memmo · meom · mmemo · mmeo
mesmo ← emsmo · memso · mesmmo · mesom · messmo · mmesmo · msemo

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "memo" and "mesmo" mean the same thing in a sentence?

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

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

"mesmo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #56 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.

Useful next steps

Pair "memo" vs "mesmo" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

Full dictionary entry for "memo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "mesmo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #31,265 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"memo" and "mesmo" 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 #31,265 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.