thesevstrêsWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: these is a noun, três is a num, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“these” is a noun and “três” is a num - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#18,727
“these” frequency rank
#167
“três” frequency rank
18894
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature these três
Definition vide tese número equivalente a dois mais um; cardinalidade de um conjunto que contenha dois elementos e outro elemento distinto; representado pelo símbolo 3 (algarismos arábicos) ou III (algarismos romanos)

Letter map: these vs três

Shared letters muted; letters that set these and três apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

5 ch
these
4 ch
três

Role in the sentence - these and três

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: these is anoun and trêsanum. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18894, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

these is recorded at frequency rank #18,727, classified as anoun. três is at rank #167, tagged as anum, pronounced /ˈtɾeʃ/.

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 18894, this pair ranks #51,981 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of these vs três

Shared letters: st. Private to "these": eh. Private to "três": .

"these" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "três" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • thesehtese · tehse · thees · thesse · thhese · thsee · tthese

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "these" for "três" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "these" is a noun and "três" a num, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "these" or "três" show up more?
"três" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #167 in our Portuguese list, against #18,727 for "these". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

You've compared "these" and "três". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "these" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "três" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #51,981 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "these" and "três" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tee vs these". 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 #51,981 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