tocavstoscoTell them apart

Quick tell: toca is a noun, tosco is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“toca” is a noun and “tosco” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#2,545
“toca” frequency rank
#33,210
“tosco” frequency rank
35755
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature toca tosco
Definition buraco, natural ou aberto por alguns animais (roedores, aves, desdentados, etc.), usado como abrigo em árvores, solo, pedras ou outros ambientes (como a casa de troncos do castor) que não é lapidado, polido, etc.; bruto, rústico

Where the eye mixes toca and tosco

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
toca
5 ch
tosco

Look-alike desk: toca vs tosco

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: toca is /ˈtɔ.kɐ/ while tosco is /ˈtoʃ.ku/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 35755, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

toca is recorded at frequency rank #2,545, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈtɔ.kɐ/. tosco is at rank #33,210, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈtoʃ.ku/.

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 35755, this pair ranks #31,244 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of toca vs tosco

Shared letters: cot. Private to "toca": a. Private to "tosco": s.

"toca" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "tosco" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tocaotca · tcoa · toac · tocca · ttoca
  • toscootsco · tocso · toscco · tosoc · tossco · tsoco · ttosco

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "toca" and "tosco" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "toca" is a noun and "tosco" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "toca" or "tosco"?
"toca" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,545 in our Portuguese list, against #33,210 for "tosco". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "toca" and "tosco" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "toca" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tosco" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #31,244 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "toca" and "tosco" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tosa vs tosco". 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 #31,244 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