pingovspingueTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#17,885
“pingo” frequency rank
#38,425
“pingue” frequency rank
56310
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pingo pingue
Definition gota; gotejamento; goteira crasso, gorduroso

Letter map: pingo vs pingue

Shared letters muted; letters that set pingo and pingue apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

5 ch
pingo
6 ch
pingue

Grammar separator: pingo vs pingue

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: pingo is anoun and pingueanadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56310, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pingo is recorded at frequency rank #17,885, classified as anoun. pingue is at rank #38,425, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈpĩ.ɡɨ/.

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 56310, this pair ranks #10,050 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pingo vs pingue

Shared letters: ginp. Private to "pingo": o. Private to "pingue": eu.

"pingo" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "pingue" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pingoipngo · pigno · pinggo · pinngo · pinog · pnigo · ppingo
  • pingueipngue · pignue · pingeu · pinggue · pinngue · pinuge · pnigue · ppingue

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "pingo" and "pingue" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pingo" is a noun and "pingue" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "pingo" or "pingue" show up more?
"pingo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,885 in our Portuguese list, against #38,425 for "pingue". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "pingo" and "pingue". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pingo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pingue" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #10,050 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pingo" and "pingue" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pingos vs pingue". 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 #10,050 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