pomovspoucoWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#44,054
“pomo” frequency rank
#172
“pouco” frequency rank
44226
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pomo pouco
Definition fruto carnudo presente em baixa quantidade

Where the eye mixes pomo and pouco

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

4 ch
pomo
5 ch
pouco

Visual trap between pomo and pouco

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pomo is /ˈpo.mu/ while pouco is /ˈpoʊ.kʊ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44226, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pomo is recorded at frequency rank #44,054, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpo.mu/. pouco is at rank #172, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈpoʊ.kʊ/.

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 44226, this pair ranks #21,289 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pomo vs pouco

Shared letters: op. Private to "pomo": m. Private to "pouco": cu.

"pomo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "pouco" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pomoopmo · pmoo · pommo · poom · ppomo
  • poucoopuco · pocuo · poucco · pouoc · ppouco · puoco

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "pomo" for "pouco" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pomo" is a noun and "pouco" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "pomo" vs "pouco" - which ranks higher?
"pouco" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #172 in our Portuguese list, against #44,054 for "pomo". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pomo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pouco" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #21,289 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pomo" and "pouco" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pito vs pomo". 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 #21,289 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