miravsmocaWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#7,185
“mira” frequency rank
#39,266
“moca” frequency rank
46451
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mira moca
Definition ato ou efeito de mirar torpe, pasmão

Where the eye mixes mira and moca

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. mira and moca follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
mira
4 ch
moca

Visual trap between mira and moca

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: mira is /ˈmi.ɾɐ/ while moca is /ˈmɔ.kɐ/. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46451, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mira is recorded at frequency rank #7,185, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈmi.ɾɐ/. moca is at rank #39,266, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈmɔ.kɐ/.

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 46451, this pair ranks #18,851 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of mira vs moca

Shared letters: am. Private to "mira": ir. Private to "moca": co.

"mira" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "moca" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mira ← imra · miar · mmira · mria
  • moca ← mcoa · mmoca · moac · mocca · omca

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "mira" and "moca" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mira" is a noun and "moca" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "mira" or "moca"?
"mira" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,185 in our Portuguese list, against #39,266 for "moca". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mira" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "moca" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #18,851 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mira" and "moca" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "maa vs moca". 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 #18,851 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