soldovssondaWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#46,066
“soldo” frequency rank
#11,157
“sonda” frequency rank
57223
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature soldo sonda
Definition salário básico de militar prumo ou objeto análogo com que se determina ou observa a profundidade das águas, ou interior de um objeto, estado de um órgão ou de um ferimento, etc

Letter map: soldo vs sonda

Shared letters muted; letters that set soldo and sonda apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. soldo and sonda follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
soldo
5 ch
sonda

Pair insight - soldo / sonda

soldo and sonda are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57223, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

soldo is recorded at frequency rank #46,066, classified as anoun. sonda is at rank #11,157, tagged as anoun.

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 57223, this pair ranks #9,457 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of soldo vs sonda

Shared letters: dos. Private to "soldo": l. Private to "sonda": an.

"soldo" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "sonda" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • soldo ← osldo · slodo · sodlo · solddo · solldo · solod · ssoldo
  • sonda ← osnda · snoda · sodna · sonad · sondda · sonnda · ssonda

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "soldo" for "sonda" ever safe?
No. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "soldo" or "sonda" show up more?
"sonda" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,157 in our Portuguese list, against #46,066 for "soldo". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "soldo" and "sonda".

  • Full dictionary entry for "soldo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sonda" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #9,457 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "soldo" and "sonda" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soldo vs sulco". 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 #9,457 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