renegarvsrevelarWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#49,673
“renegar” frequency rank
#4,516
“revelar” frequency rank
54189
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature renegar revelar
Definition abandonar uma religião para seguir outra; descrer tirar o véu a

Where the eye mixes renegar and revelar

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. renegar and revelar follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
renegar
7 ch
revelar

Why the eye confuses renegar with revelar

A purely visual mix-up. renegar (/Rɨ.nɨ.ˈɡaɾ/) and revelar (/Rɨ.vɨ.ˈlaɾ/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 54189, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

renegar is recorded at frequency rank #49,673, classified as averb, pronounced /Rɨ.nɨ.ˈɡaɾ/. revelar is at rank #4,516, tagged as averb, pronounced /Rɨ.vɨ.ˈlaɾ/.

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 54189, this pair ranks #11,462 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of renegar vs revelar

Shared letters: aer. Private to "renegar": gn. Private to "revelar": lv.

"renegar" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC  ·  "revelar" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • renegar ← ernegar · reengar · reneagr · renegarr · reneggar · renegra · rengear · rennegar
  • revelar ← ervelar · reevlar · revealr · revelarr · revellar · revelra · revlear · revvelar

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "renegar" and "revelar" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/Rɨ.nɨ.ˈɡaɾ/ versus /Rɨ.vɨ.ˈlaɾ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "renegar" or "revelar" show up more?
"revelar" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,516 in our Portuguese list, against #49,673 for "renegar". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "renegar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "revelar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #11,462 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "renegar" and "revelar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "recear vs renegar". 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 #11,462 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