mençãovsmentalWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: menção is a noun, mental is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“menção” is a noun and “mental” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#6,557
“menção” frequency rank
#3,091
“mental” frequency rank
9648
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature menção mental
Definition ato de mencionar que é relativo à mente

Letter map: menção vs mental

Shared letters muted; letters that set menção and mental apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. menção (CVCCVV) and mental (CVCCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

6 ch
menção
6 ch
mental

Grammar separator: menção vs mental

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: menção is anoun and mentalanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 9648, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

menção is recorded at frequency rank #6,557, classified as anoun. mental is at rank #3,091, tagged as anadj, pronounced /mẽ.ˈtaɫ/.

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 9648, this pair ranks #63,719 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of menção vs mental

Shared letters: emn. Private to "menção": oãç. Private to "mental": alt.

"menção" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "mental" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mental ← emntal · menatl · menntal · mentall · mentla · menttal · metnal · mmental

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "menção" and "mental" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "menção" is a noun and "mental" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "menção" vs "mental" - which ranks higher?
"mental" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,091 in our Portuguese list, against #6,557 for "menção". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "menção" and "mental".

  • Full dictionary entry for "menção" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mental" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #63,719 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "menção" and "mental" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "menção vs monção". 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 #63,719 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