saisvssimTell them apart

Quick tell: sais is a noun, sim is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“sais” is a noun and “sim” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,150
“sais” frequency rank
#147
“sim” frequency rank
11297
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sais sim
Definition substâncias voláteis dadas a uma pessoa desmaiada para fazer com que ela acorde exprime afirmação, acordo, aprovação, permissão ou consentimento

Letter map: sais vs sim

Shared letters muted; letters that set sais and sim apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
sais
3 ch
sim

Grammar separator: sais vs sim

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: sais is anoun and simanadverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11297, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sais is recorded at frequency rank #11,150, classified as anoun. sim is at rank #147, tagged as anadv, pronounced /ˈsĩ/.

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 11297, this pair ranks #61,590 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of sais vs sim

Shared letters: is. Private to "sais": a. Private to "sim": m.

"sais" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "sim" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • saissaiss · sasi · sias · ssais

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "sais" and "sim" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "sais" is a noun and "sim" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "sais" or "sim"?
"sim" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #147 in our Portuguese list, against #11,150 for "sais". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

You've compared "sais" and "sim". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "sais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sim" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #61,590 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sais" and "sim" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sais vs Sau". 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 #61,590 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