sóbriovssódioTell them apart

Quick tell: sóbrio is a adjective, sódio is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“sóbrio” is an adjective and “sódio” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#19,003
“sóbrio” frequency rank
#10,278
“sódio” frequency rank
29281
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sóbrio sódio
Definition sério, discreto elemento químico de símbolo Na, possui o número atômico 11 e massa atômica relativa de 22.989; é um metal alcalino, sólido na temperatura ambiente, com coloração branco prateado; é encontrado em grande quantidade na forma de cloreto de sódio (sal) nas águas marinhas; é a principal matéria-prima para obtenção de outros sais

Letter map: sóbrio vs sódio

Shared letters muted; letters that set sóbrio and sódio apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. sóbrio runs 6 letters (CVCCVV) against sódio's 5 (CVCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
sóbrio
5 ch
sódio

Part-of-speech tell for sóbrio / sódio

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: sóbrio is anadjective and sódioanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29281, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sóbrio is recorded at frequency rank #19,003, classified as anadj. sódio is at rank #10,278, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈsɔdju/.

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 29281, this pair ranks #39,408 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of sóbrio vs sódio

Shared letters: iosó. Private to "sóbrio": br. Private to "sódio": d.

"sóbrio" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "sódio" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "sóbrio" for "sódio" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "sóbrio" is an adjective and "sódio" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "sóbrio" or "sódio" show up more?
"sódio" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,278 in our Portuguese list, against #19,003 for "sóbrio". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "sóbrio" and "sódio". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "sóbrio" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sódio" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #39,408 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sóbrio" and "sódio" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sódio vs soir". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #39,408 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