telhavstemaWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#24,173
“telha” frequency rank
#840
“tema” frequency rank
25013
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature telha tema
Definition peça de barro cozido ou de outro material (pedra, cimento-amianto, metal, vidro, plástico, madeira etc.), usado na cobertura de casas e outros edifícios assunto

Where the eye mixes telha and tema

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
telha
4 ch
tema

Why the eye confuses telha with tema

A purely visual mix-up. telha (/ˈtɐj.ʎɐ/) and tema (/ˈte.mɐ/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 25013, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

telha is recorded at frequency rank #24,173, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈtɐj.ʎɐ/. tema is at rank #840, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈte.mɐ/.

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 25013, this pair ranks #44,402 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of telha vs tema

Shared letters: aet. Private to "telha": hl. Private to "tema": m.

"telha" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "tema" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • telhaetlha · tehla · telah · telhha · tellha · tleha · ttelha
  • temaetma · team · temma · tmea · ttema

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "telha" and "tema" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈtɐj.ʎɐ/ versus /ˈte.mɐ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "telha" vs "tema" - which ranks higher?
"tema" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #840 in our Portuguese list, against #24,173 for "telha". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "telha" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tema" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #44,402 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "telha" and "tema" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "telha vs tralha". 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 #44,402 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