pertovspostoWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: perto is a adverb, posto is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“perto” is an adverb and “posto” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#509
“perto” frequency rank
#1,722
“posto” frequency rank
2231
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perto posto
Definition a pouca distância colocado, plantado, posicionado

Where the eye mixes perto and posto

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

5 ch
perto
5 ch
posto

Look-alike desk: perto vs posto

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: perto is /ˈpɛh.tʊ/, /ˈpɛr.tʊ/ while posto is /ˈpoʃ.tʊ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adverb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2231, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perto is recorded at frequency rank #509, classified as anadv, pronounced /ˈpɛh.tʊ/, /ˈpɛr.tʊ/. posto is at rank #1,722, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈpoʃ.tʊ/.

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 2231, this pair ranks #73,223 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of perto vs posto

Shared letters: opt. Private to "perto": er. Private to "posto": s.

"perto" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "posto" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pertoeprto · perot · perrto · pertto · pperto
  • postoopsto · posot · possto · postto · potso · pposto · psoto

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "perto" and "posto" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "perto" is an adverb and "posto" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "perto" or "posto"?
"perto" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #509 in our Portuguese list, against #1,722 for "posto". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "perto" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "posto" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #73,223 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perto" and "posto" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Pluto vs posto". 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 #73,223 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