sábadovssalãoWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#880
“sábado” frequency rank
#2,751
“salão” frequency rank
3631
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sábado salão
Definition sexto dia da semana pela norma ISO 8601, posterior à sexta-feira e anterior ao domingo; por fundamentação bíblica e etimológica, é considerado o último dia da semana sala grande

Where the eye mixes sábado and salão

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

6 ch
sábado
5 ch
salão

Look-alike desk: sábado vs salão

A purely visual mix-up. sábado (/ˈsa.bɐ.dʊ/) and salão (/sɐ.ˈlɐ̃w̃/) 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 3631, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sábado is recorded at frequency rank #880, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈsa.bɐ.dʊ/. salão is at rank #2,751, tagged as anoun, pronounced /sɐ.ˈlɐ̃w̃/.

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 3631, this pair ranks #71,475 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of sábado vs salão

Shared letters: aos. Private to "sábado": bdá. Private to "salão": .

"sábado" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "salão" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "sábado" and "salão" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈsa.bɐ.dʊ/ versus /sɐ.ˈlɐ̃w̃/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "sábado" or "salão" show up more?
"sábado" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #880 in our Portuguese list, against #2,751 for "salão". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "sábado" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "salão" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #71,475 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sábado" and "salão" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "salão vs soldo". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #71,475 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