racevsRatWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#12,135
“race” frequency rank
#37,067
“Rat” frequency rank
49202
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature race Rat
Definition raça conselho

Where the eye mixes race and Rat

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. race runs 4 letters (CVCV) against Rat's 3 (CVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
race
3 ch
Rat

Look-alike desk: race vs Rat

A purely visual mix-up. race (/ɹeɪs/) and Rat (/raːt/) 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 49202, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

race is recorded at frequency rank #12,135, classified as anoun, pronounced /ɹeɪs/. Rat is at rank #37,067, tagged as anoun, pronounced /raːt/.

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 49202, this pair ranks #15,858 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of race vs Rat

Shared letters: ar. Private to "race": ce. Private to "Rat": t.

"race" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "Rat" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • race ← racce · raec · rcae · rrace

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "race" for "Rat" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/ɹeɪs/ versus /raːt/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "race" or "Rat" show up more?
"race" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,135 in our Portuguese list, against #37,067 for "Rat". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "race" and "Rat" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "race" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Rat" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #15,858 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "race" and "Rat" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rabi vs Rat". 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 #15,858 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