portãovspotroWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#5,450
“portão” frequency rank
#33,548
“potro” frequency rank
38998
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature portão potro
Definition porta grande denominação dada ao cavalo do nascimento até a troca dos dentes de leite por volta do quarto ano de idade; animal novo

Where the eye mixes portão and potro

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. portão runs 6 letters (CVCCVV) against potro's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
portão
5 ch
potro

Why the eye confuses portão with potro

A purely visual mix-up. portão (/puɾ.ˈtɐ̃w̃/) and potro (/ˈpo.tɾu/) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38998, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

portão is recorded at frequency rank #5,450, classified as anoun, pronounced /puɾ.ˈtɐ̃w̃/. potro is at rank #33,548, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpo.tɾu/.

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 38998, this pair ranks #27,365 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of portão vs potro

Shared letters: oprt. Private to "portão": ã. Private to "potro": -.

"portão" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "potro" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • potro ← optro · potor · potrro · pottro · ppotro · ptoro

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "portão" and "potro" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/puɾ.ˈtɐ̃w̃/ versus /ˈpo.tɾu/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "portão" or "potro" show up more?
"portão" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,450 in our Portuguese list, against #33,548 for "potro". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "portão" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "potro" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #27,365 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "portão" and "potro" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pomo vs potro". 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 #27,365 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