Which to use
“pastar” is a verb and “pistão” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #48,580
- “pastar” frequency rank
- #26,846
- “pistão” frequency rank
- 75426
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pastar | pistão |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | comer a erva de | peça cilíndrica normalmente feita de alumínio ou liga de alumínio, que se move longitudinalmente no interior do cilindro dos motores de explosão |
Where the eye mixes pastar and pistão
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. pastar (CVCCVC) and pistão (CVCCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Visual trap between pastar and pistão
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pastar is /pɐʃ.ˈtaɾ/ while pistão is /piʃ.ˈtɐ̃w̃/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 75426, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pastar is recorded at frequency rank #48,580, classified as averb, pronounced /pɐʃ.ˈtaɾ/. pistão is at rank #26,846, tagged as anoun, pronounced /piʃ.ˈtɐ̃w̃/.
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 75426, this pair ranks #2,299 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of pastar vs pistão
Shared letters: pst. Private to "pastar": ar. Private to "pistão": ioã.
"pastar" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "pistão" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- pastar ← apstar · pasatr · passtar · pastarr · pastra · pasttar · patsar · ppastar
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "pastar" and "pistão" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "pastar" or "pistão" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "pastar" and "pistão" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pastar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pistão" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #2,299 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pastar" and "pistão" 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 #2,299 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.