natovsnuloWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#13,343
“nato” frequency rank
#18,400
“nulo” frequency rank
31743
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature nato nulo
Definition particípio irregular do verbo nascer que não existe

Letter map: nato vs nulo

Shared letters muted; letters that set nato and nulo apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
nato
4 ch
nulo

Role in the sentence - nato and nulo

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: nato is averb and nuloanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 31743, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

nato is recorded at frequency rank #13,343, classified as averb. 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 31743, this pair ranks #36,249 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of nato vs nulo

Shared letters: no. Private to "nato": at. Private to "nulo": lu.

"nato" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "nulo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • natoanto · naot · natto · nnato · ntao
  • nulonluo · nnulo · nullo · nuol · unlo

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "nato" and "nulo" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "nato" is a verb and "nulo" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "nato" or "nulo" show up more?
"nato" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,343 in our Portuguese list, against #18,400 for "nulo". 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 "nato" and "nulo".

  • Full dictionary entry for "nato" 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 #36,249 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "nato" and "nulo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "null vs nulo". 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 #36,249 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