nabovsnuloTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#38,387
“nabo” frequency rank
#18,400
“nulo” frequency rank
56787
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature nabo nulo
Definition planta herbácea da espécie Brassica rapa, de raiz carnuda, branca, arredondada ou pontiaguda com variedades muito cultivadas para a alimentação que não existe

Where the eye mixes nabo and nulo

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

4 ch
nabo
4 ch
nulo

Look-alike desk: nabo vs nulo

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: nabo is /ˈna.bu/ while nulo is /ˈnu.lu/. 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 56787, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

nabo is recorded at frequency rank #38,387, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈna.bu/. nulo is at rank #18,400, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈnu.lu/.

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 56787, this pair ranks #9,746 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of nabo vs nulo

Shared letters: no. Private to "nabo": ab. Private to "nulo": lu.

"nabo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "nulo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • naboanbo · nabbo · naob · nbao · nnabo
  • nulonluo · nnulo · nullo · nuol · unlo

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "nabo" for "nulo" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "nabo" is a noun and "nulo" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "nabo" or "nulo" show up more?
"nulo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,400 in our Portuguese list, against #38,387 for "nabo". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "nabo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "nulo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #9,746 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "nabo" and "nulo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nabo vs nami". 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 #9,746 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