paísvspasseTell them apart

Which to use

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

#214
“país” frequency rank
#2,337
“passe” frequency rank
2551
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature país passe
Definition região; terra licença, permissão

Where the eye mixes país and passe

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

4 ch
país
5 ch
passe

Visual trap between país and passe

A purely visual mix-up. país (/pɐ.ˈiʃ/) and passe (/ˈpa.sɨ/) 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 2551, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

país is recorded at frequency rank #214, classified as anoun, pronounced /pɐ.ˈiʃ/. passe is at rank #2,337, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpa.sɨ/.

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 2551, this pair ranks #72,801 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of país vs passe

Shared letters: aps. Private to "país": í. Private to "passe": e.

"país" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "passe" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • passeapsse · pase · pases · ppasse · psase

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "país" and "passe" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/pɐ.ˈiʃ/ versus /ˈpa.sɨ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "país" vs "passe" - which ranks higher?
"país" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #214 in our Portuguese list, against #2,337 for "passe". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "país" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "passe" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #72,801 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "país" and "passe" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pale vs passe". 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 #72,801 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