tem vs then, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“tem” is a verb and “then” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#33
“tem” frequency rank: #18,204
“then” frequency rank: 18237
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	tem	then
Definition	terceira pessoa do singular do presente do indicativo do verbo ter	então, aí. daí

Letter map: tem vs then

Shared letters muted; letters that set tem and then apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch

tem

4 ch

then

Grammar separator: tem vs then

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: tem is averb and thenanadverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18237, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tem is recorded at frequency rank #33, classified as averb. then is at rank #18,204, tagged as anadv, pronounced /ˈðɛn/.

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 18237, this pair ranks #52,802 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of tem vs then

Shared letters: et. Private to "tem": m. Private to "then": hn.

"tem" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "then" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

then ← hten · tehn · thenn · thhen · thne · tthen

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "tem" and "then" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tem" is a verb and "then" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary Portuguese text, does "tem" or "then" show up more?

"tem" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #33 in our Portuguese list, against #18,204 for "then". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've compared "tem" and "then". Here's where to go from here.

Full dictionary entry for "tem" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "then" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #52,802 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"tem" and "then" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "then vs thorn". 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 #52,802 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.