talcovstroçoTell them apart

Which to use

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

#37,106
“talco” frequency rank
#11,175
“troço” frequency rank
48281
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature talco troço
Definition mineral derivado do magnésio e que se apresenta em agregados de lâminas traste, tralha

Where the eye mixes talco and troço

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. talco (CVCCV) and troço (CCVCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
talco
5 ch
troço

Why the eye confuses talco with troço

A purely visual mix-up. talco (/ˈtaɫ.ku/) and troço (/ˈtɾo.su/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48281, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

talco is recorded at frequency rank #37,106, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈtaɫ.ku/. troço is at rank #11,175, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈtɾo.su/.

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 48281, this pair ranks #16,908 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of talco vs troço

Shared letters: ot. Private to "talco": acl. Private to "troço": rç.

"talco" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "troço" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • talco ← atlco · taclo · talcco · tallco · taloc · tlaco · ttalco

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "talco" and "troço" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈtaɫ.ku/ versus /ˈtɾo.su/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "talco" or "troço" show up more?
"troço" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,175 in our Portuguese list, against #37,106 for "talco". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "talco" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "troço" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #16,908 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "talco" and "troço" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "talco vs tampo". 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 #16,908 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