todovstuboTell them apart

Quick tell: todo is a adjective, tubo is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#111
“todo” frequency rank
#7,227
“tubo” frequency rank
7338
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature todo tubo
Definition completo cilindro oco; cano; ducto

Where the eye mixes todo and tubo

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
todo
4 ch
tubo

Why the eye confuses todo with tubo

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: todo is /ˈto.du/ while tubo is /'tubu/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7338, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

todo is recorded at frequency rank #111, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈto.du/. tubo is at rank #7,227, tagged as anoun, pronounced /'tubu/.

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 7338, this pair ranks #66,813 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of todo vs tubo

Shared letters: ot. Private to "todo": d. Private to "tubo": bu.

"todo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "tubo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • todootdo · tdoo · toddo · tood · ttodo
  • tubotbuo · ttubo · tubbo · tuob · utbo

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "todo" for "tubo" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "todo" is an adjective and "tubo" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "todo" or "tubo"?
"todo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #111 in our Portuguese list, against #7,227 for "tubo". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "todo" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tubo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #66,813 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "todo" and "tubo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tubo vs tufo". 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 #66,813 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