tervsteveTell them apart

Which to use

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

#60
“ter” frequency rank
#293
“teve” frequency rank
353
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ter teve
Definition acompanhado de verbo no particípio regular, indica ação passada terceira pessoa do singular do pretérito perfeito do verbo ter

Letter map: ter vs teve

Shared letters muted; letters that set ter and teve apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
ter
4 ch
teve

Pair insight - ter / teve

ter and teve are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 353, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ter is recorded at frequency rank #60, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈteɹ/. teve is at rank #293, 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 353, this pair ranks #75,281 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ter vs teve

Shared letters: et. Private to "ter": r. Private to "teve": v.

"ter" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "teve" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • teveetve · teev · tevve · tteve · tvee

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ter" for "teve" ever safe?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Which is more common, "ter" or "teve"?
"ter" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #60 in our Portuguese list, against #293 for "teve". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "ter" and "teve". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ter" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "teve" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #75,281 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ter" and "teve" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "teve vs tune". 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 #75,281 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