mil vs mui, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#263
“mil” frequency rank: #23,741
“mui” frequency rank: 24004
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	mil	mui
Definition	muitos, inúmeros, uma grande quantidade:	em alto grau

Where the eye mixes mil and mui

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

3 ch

mil

3 ch

mui

Why the eye confuses mil with mui

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: mil is /miw/, /mil/ while mui is /ˈmũj/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24004, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mil is recorded at frequency rank #263, classified as anadj, pronounced /miw/, /mil/. mui is at rank #23,741, tagged as anadv, pronounced /ˈmũj/.

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 24004, this pair ranks #45,709 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of mil vs mui

Shared letters: im. Private to "mil": l. Private to "mui": u.

"mil" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "mui" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "mil" and "mui" mean the same thing in a sentence?

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

Frequency check: "mil" vs "mui" - which ranks higher?

"mil" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #263 in our Portuguese list, against #23,741 for "mui". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

Full dictionary entry for "mil" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "mui" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #45,709 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"mil" and "mui" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maa vs mui". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #45,709 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.