vsretoTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#9,922
“ré” frequency rank
#10,954
“reto” frequency rank
20876
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature reto
Definition segunda nota musical da escala de dó maior que não tem curvatura, sinuosidade ou inflexão; que segue sempre a mesma direção; direito, direto

Letter map: ré vs reto

Shared letters muted; letters that set and reto apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

2 ch
ré
4 ch
reto

Role in the sentence - ré and reto

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: is anoun and retoanadjective. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 20876, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

is recorded at frequency rank #9,922, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈRɛ/. reto is at rank #10,954, tagged as anadj.

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 20876, this pair ranks #49,534 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ré vs reto

Shared letters: r. Private to "ré": é. Private to "reto": eot.

"ré" · 2 letters · shape CV  ·  "reto" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • retoerto · reot · retto · rreto · rteo

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ré" and "reto" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ré" is a noun and "reto" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "ré" or "reto"?
"ré" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,922 in our Portuguese list, against #10,954 for "reto". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "ré" and "reto". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ré" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "reto" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #49,534 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ré" and "reto" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ratio vs reto". 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 #49,534 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