Which to use
“tell” is a verb and “til” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #9,770
- “tell” frequency rank
- #44,136
- “til” frequency rank
- 53906
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | tell | til |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | contar, narrar | sinal diacrítico (~) utilizado para modificar a pronúncia de determinadas letras no português (indicando nasalização) e em alguns outros idiomas ( bretão ...) |
Letter map: tell vs til
Shared letters muted; letters that set tell and til apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.
Role in the sentence - tell and til
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: tell is averb and tilanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53906, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
tell is recorded at frequency rank #9,770, classified as averb. til is at rank #44,136, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈʧiw/.
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 53906, this pair ranks #11,694 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of tell vs til
Shared letters: lt. Private to "tell": e. Private to "til": i.
"tell" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "til" · 3 letters · shape CVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- tell ← etll · tel · tlel · ttell
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "tell" and "til" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "tell" vs "til" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Pair "tell" vs "til" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "tell" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "til" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #11,694 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "tell" and "til" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tifo vs til". 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 #11,694 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.