shadow vs show, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“shadow” is a noun and “show” is an intj - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#16,398
“shadow” frequency rank: #778
“show” frequency rank: 17176
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	shadow	show
Definition	sombra; obscuridade	expressa apreço

Letter map: shadow vs show

Shared letters muted; letters that set shadow and show apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

6 ch

shadow

4 ch

show

Role in the sentence - shadow and show

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: shadow is anoun and showanintj. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17176, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

shadow is recorded at frequency rank #16,398, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈʃædəʊ/. show is at rank #778, tagged as anintj.

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 17176, this pair ranks #54,151 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of shadow vs show

Shared letters: hosw. Private to "shadow": ad. Private to "show": -.

"shadow" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC · "show" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

shadow ← hsadow · sahdow · shaddow · shadoww · shadwo · shaodw · shdaow · shhadow
show ← hsow · shhow · showw · shwo · sohw · sshow

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "shadow" for "show" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "shadow" is a noun and "show" an intj, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary Portuguese text, does "shadow" or "show" show up more?

"show" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #778 in our Portuguese list, against #16,398 for "shadow". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "shadow" and "show".

Full dictionary entry for "shadow" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "show" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #54,151 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"shadow" and "show" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "shade vs shadow". 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 #54,151 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.