poçavsporçãoWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“poça” and “porção” are a confusable Portuguese pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#29,093
“poça” frequency rank
#7,200
“porção” frequency rank
36293
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature poça porção
Definition cavidade pouco profunda onde se acumula água parte de algo, pedaço, ração, dose:

Where the eye mixes poça and porção

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. poça runs 4 letters (CVCV) against porção's 6 (CVCCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
poça
6 ch
porção

Visual trap between poça and porção

A purely visual mix-up. poça (/ˈpo.sɐ/) and porção (/puɾ.ˈsɐ̃w̃/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36293, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

poça is recorded at frequency rank #29,093, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpo.sɐ/. porção is at rank #7,200, tagged as anoun, pronounced /puɾ.ˈsɐ̃w̃/.

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 36293, this pair ranks #30,558 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of poça vs porção

Shared letters: opç. Private to "poça": a. Private to "porção": rã.

"poça" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "porção" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "poça" and "porção" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈpo.sɐ/ versus /puɾ.ˈsɐ̃w̃/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "poça" or "porção" show up more?
"porção" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,200 in our Portuguese list, against #29,093 for "poça". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "poça" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "porção" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #30,558 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "poça" and "porção" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "paçoca vs poça". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #30,558 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