ni vs nos, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#8,234
“ni” frequency rank: #42
“nos” frequency rank: 8276
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	ni	nos
Definition	nós, pronome da segunda pessoa do plural	a nós

Letter map: ni vs nos

Shared letters muted; letters that set ni and nos apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

2 ch

3 ch

nos

Pair insight - ni / nos

ni and nos 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8276, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ni is recorded at frequency rank #8,234, classified as apron. nos is at rank #42, tagged as apron, pronounced /ˈnuʃ/.

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 8276, this pair ranks #65,551 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ni vs nos

Shared letters: n. Private to "ni": i. Private to "nos": os.

"ni" · 2 letters · shape CV · "nos" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ni" and "nos" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.

Frequency check: "ni" vs "nos" - which ranks higher?

"nos" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #42 in our Portuguese list, against #8,234 for "ni". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "ni" and "nos".

Full dictionary entry for "ni" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "nos" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #65,551 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"ni" and "nos" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nami vs ni". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #65,551 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.