Which to use
“past” is an adjective and “pastar” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #20,081
- “past” frequency rank
- #48,580
- “pastar” frequency rank
- 68661
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | past | pastar |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | passado | comer a erva de |
Where the eye mixes past and pastar
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. past runs 4 letters (CVCC) against pastar's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between past and pastar
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: past is /pɑːst/ while pastar is /pɐʃ.ˈtaɾ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “past” sits inside “pastar”, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68661, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
past is recorded at frequency rank #20,081, classified as anadj, pronounced /pɑːst/. pastar is at rank #48,580, tagged as averb, pronounced /pɐʃ.ˈtaɾ/.
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 68661, this pair ranks #4,206 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of past vs pastar
Shared letters: apst. Private to "past": -. Private to "pastar": r.
"past" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "pastar" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "past" and "pastar" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "past" or "pastar" show up more?
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 "past" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pastar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #4,206 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "past" and "pastar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pastar vs pasteur". 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 #4,206 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.