tenazvsterãoTell them apart

Quick tell: tenaz is a adjective, terão is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“tenaz” is an adjective and “terão” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#42,239
“tenaz” frequency rank
#2,294
“terão” frequency rank
44533
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tenaz terão
Definition muito aderente terceira pessoa do plural do futuro do indicativo do verbo ter

Letter map: tenaz vs terão

Shared letters muted; letters that set tenaz and terão apart highlighted. Shared run: 2. tenaz (CVCVC) and terão (CVCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
tenaz
5 ch
terão

Part-of-speech tell for tenaz / terão

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: tenaz is anadjective and terãoaverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44533, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tenaz is recorded at frequency rank #42,239, classified as anadj, pronounced /tɨ.ˈnaʃ/. terão is at rank #2,294, tagged as averb.

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 44533, this pair ranks #20,929 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of tenaz vs terão

Shared letters: et. Private to "tenaz": anz. Private to "terão": orã.

"tenaz" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "terão" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tenaz ← etnaz · teanz · tenazz · tennaz · tenza · tneaz · ttenaz

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "tenaz" for "terão" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tenaz" is an adjective and "terão" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "tenaz" vs "terão" - which ranks higher?
"terão" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,294 in our Portuguese list, against #42,239 for "tenaz". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pair "tenaz" vs "terão" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "tenaz" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "terão" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #20,929 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tenaz" and "terão" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tenaz vs tengo". 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 #20,929 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