nos vs nous, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#42
“nos” frequency rank: #31,892
“nous” frequency rank: 31934
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	nos	nous
Definition	a nós	nós, nos, pronome pessoal da primeira pessoa do plural.

Where the eye mixes nos and nous

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

3 ch

nos

4 ch

nous

Why the eye confuses nos with nous

A purely visual mix-up. nos (/ˈnuʃ/) and nous (/nu/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 31934, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

nos is recorded at frequency rank #42, classified as apron, pronounced /ˈnuʃ/. nous is at rank #31,892, tagged as apron, pronounced /nu/.

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 31934, this pair ranks #35,999 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of nos vs nous

Shared letters: nos. Private to "nos": -. Private to "nous": u.

"nos" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "nous" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

nous ← nnous · nosu · nouss · nuos · onus

Frequently Asked Questions

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

No. They are said differently (/ˈnuʃ/ versus /nu/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.

In ordinary Portuguese text, does "nos" or "nous" show up more?

"nos" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #42 in our Portuguese list, against #31,892 for "nous". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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 "nos" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "nous" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #35,999 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"nos" and "nous" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "noon vs nous". 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 #35,999 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.