vilvsvoltWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#26,593
“vil” frequency rank
#35,827
“volt” frequency rank
62420
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature vil volt
Definition reles unidade de medida de voltagem; o mesmo que vóltio

Where the eye mixes vil and volt

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

3 ch
vil
4 ch
volt

Visual trap between vil and volt

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: vil is /ˈviɫ/ while volt is /ˈvɔɫt/. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62420, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

vil is recorded at frequency rank #26,593, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈviɫ/. volt is at rank #35,827, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈvɔɫt/.

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 62420, this pair ranks #6,681 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of vil vs volt

Shared letters: lv. Private to "vil": i. Private to "volt": ot.

"vil" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "volt" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • voltovlt · vlot · vollt · voltt · votl · vvolt

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "vil" for "volt" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "vil" is an adjective and "volt" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Portuguese text, does "vil" or "volt" show up more?
"vil" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,593 in our Portuguese list, against #35,827 for "volt". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "vil" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "volt" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #6,681 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "vil" and "volt" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "velo vs volt". 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 #6,681 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