theyvstreWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: they is a pronoun, tre is a num, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“they” is a pronoun and “tre” is a num - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,171
“they” frequency rank
#14,981
“tre” frequency rank
26152
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature they tre
Definition pronome pessoal de terceira pessoa plural referente a um grupo de pessoas sem especificação de gênero; eles ou elas três

Letter map: they vs tre

Shared letters muted; letters that set they and tre apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
they
3 ch
tre

Part-of-speech tell for they / tre

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: they is apronoun and treanum. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26152, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

they is recorded at frequency rank #11,171, classified as apron. tre is at rank #14,981, tagged as anum, pronounced /tre/.

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 26152, this pair ranks #43,039 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of they vs tre

Shared letters: et. Private to "they": hy. Private to "tre": r.

"they" · 4 letters · shape CCVV  ·  "tre" · 3 letters · shape CCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • theyhtey · tehy · theyy · thhey · thye · tthey

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "they" for "tre" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "they" is a pronoun and "tre" a num, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "they" or "tre"?
"they" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,171 in our Portuguese list, against #14,981 for "tre". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "they" vs "tre" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "they" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #43,039 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "they" and "tre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tre vs trema". 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 #43,039 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