passadavspassadoWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: passada is a noun, passado is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“passada” is a noun and “passado” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,340
“passada” frequency rank
#418
“passado” frequency rank
1758
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature passada passado
Definition ato de dar um passo diz-se do evento que não mais ocorre ou da coisa que não mais existe

Letter map: passada vs passado

Shared letters muted; letters that set passada and passado apart highlighted. Shared run: 6.

7 ch
passada
7 ch
passado

Grammar separator: passada vs passado

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: passada is anoun and passadoanadjective. On the page they differ by a single letter - a in “passada” becomes o in “passado”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1758, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

passada is recorded at frequency rank #1,340, classified as anoun, pronounced /pɐ.ˈsa.dɐ/. passado is at rank #418, tagged as anadj.

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 1758, this pair ranks #73,749 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of passada vs passado

Shared letters: adps. Private to "passada": -. Private to "passado": o.

"passada" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV  ·  "passado" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • passadaapssada · pasada · pasasda · passaad · passadda · passdaa · ppassada · psasada
  • passadoapssado · pasado · pasasdo · passaddo · passaod · passdao · ppassado · psasado

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "passada" and "passado" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "passada" is a noun and "passado" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "passada" or "passado" show up more?
"passado" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #418 in our Portuguese list, against #1,340 for "passada". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "passada" and "passado".

  • Full dictionary entry for "passada" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "passado" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #73,749 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "passada" and "passado" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "passada vs pescada". 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 #73,749 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