Which to use
“pouco” is an adjective and “poupa” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #172
- “pouco” frequency rank
- #17,109
- “poupa” frequency rank
- 17281
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pouco | poupa |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | presente em baixa quantidade | ave coraciiforme, migratória, da família dos upupídeos (Upupa epops), encontrada na Europa, África e Ásia, de plumagem rosada, asas e cauda com bandas pretas e brancas, bico longo, curvo e pontiagudo e cabeça com uma grande crista de penas |
Where the eye mixes pouco and poupa
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: pouco vs poupa
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pouco is /ˈpoʊ.kʊ/ while poupa is /ˈpow.pɐ/. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17281, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pouco is recorded at frequency rank #172, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈpoʊ.kʊ/. poupa is at rank #17,109, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpow.pɐ/.
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 17281, this pair ranks #54,007 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of pouco vs poupa
Shared letters: opu. Private to "pouco": c. Private to "poupa": a.
"pouco" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV · "poupa" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "pouco" for "poupa" ever safe?
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "pouco" or "poupa" show up more?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "pouco" and "poupa" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pouco" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "poupa" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #54,007 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pouco" and "poupa" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pola vs poupa". 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 #54,007 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.