unsvsusWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: uns is a article, us is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“uns” is an article and “us” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#485
“uns” frequency rank
#999
“us” frequency rank
1484
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature uns us
Definition alguns; certas pessoas nos

Letter map: uns vs us

Shared letters muted; letters that set uns and us apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
uns
2 ch
us

Part-of-speech tell for uns / us

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: uns is anarticle and usapronoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1484, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

uns is recorded at frequency rank #485, classified as anarticle. us is at rank #999, tagged as apron, pronounced /ʌs/.

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 1484, this pair ranks #74,075 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of uns vs us

Shared letters: su. Private to "uns": n. Private to "us": -.

"uns" · 3 letters · shape VCC  ·  "us" · 2 letters · shape VC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "uns" and "us" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "uns" is an article and "us" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "uns" vs "us" - which ranks higher?
"uns" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #485 in our Portuguese list, against #999 for "us". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "uns" and "us".

  • Full dictionary entry for "uns" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "us" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #74,075 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "uns" and "us" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "uns vs unser". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #74,075 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