provocadorvsprovocarWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: provocador is a adjective, provocar is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“provocador” is an adjective and “provocar” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#37,483
“provocador” frequency rank
#4,848
“provocar” frequency rank
42331
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature provocador provocar
Definition que provoca algo desafiar

Letter map: provocador vs provocar

Shared letters muted; letters that set provocador and provocar apart highlighted. Shared run: 8. provocador runs 10 letters (CCVCVCVCVC) against provocar's 8 (CCVCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

10 ch
provocador
8 ch
provocar

Part-of-speech tell for provocador / provocar

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: provocador is anadjective and provocaraverb. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 42331, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

provocador is recorded at frequency rank #37,483, classified as anadj. provocar is at rank #4,848, tagged as averb, pronounced /pɾu.vu.ˈkaɾ/.

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 42331, this pair ranks #23,465 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of provocador vs provocar

Shared letters: acoprv. Private to "provocador": d. Private to "provocar": -.

"provocador" · 10 letters · shape CCVCVCVCVC  ·  "provocar" · 8 letters · shape CCVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • provocador ← porvocador · pprovocador · proovcador · provcoador · provoacdor · provocaddor · provocadorr · provocadro
  • provocar ← porvocar · pprovocar · proovcar · provcoar · provoacr · provocarr · provoccar · provocra

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "provocador" for "provocar" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "provocador" is an adjective and "provocar" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "provocador" vs "provocar" - which ranks higher?
"provocar" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,848 in our Portuguese list, against #37,483 for "provocador". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pair "provocador" vs "provocar" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "provocador" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "provocar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #23,465 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "provocador" and "provocar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "provar vs provocar". 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 #23,465 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