pacasvspavãoWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: pacas is a adverb, pavão is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“pacas” is an adverb and “pavão” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#43,064
“pacas” frequency rank
#19,519
“pavão” frequency rank
62583
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pacas pavão
Definition muito pendão, flor masculina do milho

Letter map: pacas vs pavão

Shared letters muted; letters that set pacas and pavão apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

5 ch
pacas
5 ch
pavão

Grammar separator: pacas vs pavão

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: pacas is anadverb and pavãoanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62583, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pacas is recorded at frequency rank #43,064, classified as anadv. pavão is at rank #19,519, tagged as anoun, pronounced /pa.'boŋ/.

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 62583, this pair ranks #6,585 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pacas vs pavão

Shared letters: ap. Private to "pacas": cs. Private to "pavão": ovã.

"pacas" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "pavão" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pacasapcas · paacs · pacass · paccas · pacsa · pcaas · ppacas

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "pacas" for "pavão" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pacas" is an adverb and "pavão" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "pacas" or "pavão"?
"pavão" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,519 in our Portuguese list, against #43,064 for "pacas". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "pacas" and "pavão".

  • Full dictionary entry for "pacas" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pavão" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #6,585 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pacas" and "pavão" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pacas vs pança". 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 #6,585 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