minarvsmirarWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“minar” and “mirar” are a confusable Portuguese pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#26,813
“minar” frequency rank
#27,178
“mirar” frequency rank
53991
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature minar mirar
Definition escavar para extrair da terra metais, líquidos, etc olhar para algo

Letter map: minar vs mirar

Shared letters muted; letters that set minar and mirar apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. minar and mirar follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
minar
5 ch
mirar

Pair insight - minar / mirar

minar and mirar are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by a single letter - n in “minar” becomes r in “mirar”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53991, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

minar is recorded at frequency rank #26,813, classified as averb. mirar is at rank #27,178, tagged as averb, pronounced /mi.ˈɾaɾ/.

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 53991, this pair ranks #11,641 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of minar vs mirar

Shared letters: aimr. Private to "minar": n. Private to "mirar": -.

"minar" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "mirar" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • minar ← imnar · mianr · minarr · minnar · minra · mminar · mniar
  • mirar ← imrar · miarr · mirarr · mirrar · mmirar · mriar

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "minar" for "mirar" ever safe?
No. They differ by a single letter - n in “minar” becomes r in “mirar”, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "minar" vs "mirar" - which ranks higher?
"minar" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,813 in our Portuguese list, against #27,178 for "mirar". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've compared "minar" and "mirar". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "minar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mirar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #11,641 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "minar" and "mirar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mirar vs mirra". 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 #11,641 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