sobrevssorryWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: sobre is a adverb, sorry is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“sobre” is an adverb and “sorry” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#53
“sobre” frequency rank
#14,719
“sorry” frequency rank
14772
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sobre sorry
Definition emprega-se para designar que o vento sopra por ante-avante do pano expressa desculpas

Letter map: sobre vs sorry

Shared letters muted; letters that set sobre and sorry apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch
sobre
5 ch
sorry

Grammar separator: sobre vs sorry

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: sobre is anadverb and sorryanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 14772, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sobre is recorded at frequency rank #53, classified as anadv, pronounced /ˈso.bɾɨ/. sorry is at rank #14,719, tagged as anadj.

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 14772, this pair ranks #57,222 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of sobre vs sorry

Shared letters: ors. Private to "sobre": be. Private to "sorry": y.

"sobre" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "sorry" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sobreosbre · sbore · sobbre · sober · sobrre · sorbe · ssobre
  • sorryosrry · sorryy · sory · soryr · srory · ssorry

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "sobre" for "sorry" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "sobre" is an adverb and "sorry" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "sobre" or "sorry"?
"sobre" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #53 in our Portuguese list, against #14,719 for "sorry". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pair "sobre" vs "sorry" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "sobre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sorry" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #57,222 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sobre" and "sorry" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soir vs sorry". 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 #57,222 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