receitavsrecitarTell them apart

Quick tell: receita is a noun, recitar is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“receita” is a noun and “recitar” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,283
“receita” frequency rank
#36,193
“recitar” frequency rank
39476
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature receita recitar
Definition fórmula para a preparação de produtos culinários ou industriais; prescrição dizer em voz alta e clara, lendo ou não

Where the eye mixes receita and recitar

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. receita (CVCVVCV) and recitar (CVCVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
receita
7 ch
recitar

Why the eye confuses receita with recitar

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: receita is /Rɨ.ˈsɐj.tɐ/ while recitar is /Rɨ.si.ˈtaɾ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 4 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39476, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

receita is recorded at frequency rank #3,283, classified as anoun, pronounced /Rɨ.ˈsɐj.tɐ/. recitar is at rank #36,193, tagged as averb, pronounced /Rɨ.si.ˈtaɾ/.

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 39476, this pair ranks #26,759 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of receita vs recitar

Shared letters: aceirt. Private to "receita": -. Private to "recitar": -.

"receita" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCV  ·  "recitar" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • receita ← erceita · rceeita · recceita · receiat · receitta · recetia · recieta · reecita
  • recitar ← ercitar · rceitar · reccitar · reciatr · recitarr · recitra · recittar · rectiar

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "receita" and "recitar" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "receita" is a noun and "recitar" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "receita" vs "recitar" - which ranks higher?
"receita" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,283 in our Portuguese list, against #36,193 for "recitar". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "receita" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "recitar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #26,759 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "receita" and "recitar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "recitar vs refinar". 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 #26,759 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