vingarvsvirarWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“vingar” and “virar” are a confusable Portuguese pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#9,422
“vingar” frequency rank
#2,457
“virar” frequency rank
11879
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature vingar virar
Definition tomar satisfação de alguém; realizar uma vingança: mudar, com um movimento em linha curva, a direção ou posição de algo ou alguém

Where the eye mixes vingar and virar

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. vingar runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against virar's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
vingar
5 ch
virar

Visual trap between vingar and virar

A purely visual mix-up. vingar (/vĩ.ˈɡaɾ/) and virar (/vi.ˈɾaɾ/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11879, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

vingar is recorded at frequency rank #9,422, classified as averb, pronounced /vĩ.ˈɡaɾ/. virar is at rank #2,457, tagged as averb, pronounced /vi.ˈɾaɾ/.

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 11879, this pair ranks #60,870 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of vingar vs virar

Shared letters: airv. Private to "vingar": gn. Private to "virar": -.

"vingar" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "virar" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • vingar ← ivngar · vignar · vinagr · vingarr · vinggar · vingra · vinngar · vnigar
  • virar ← ivrar · viarr · virarr · virra · virrar · vriar · vvirar

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "vingar" for "virar" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/vĩ.ˈɡaɾ/ versus /vi.ˈɾaɾ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "vingar" vs "virar" - which ranks higher?
"virar" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,457 in our Portuguese list, against #9,422 for "vingar". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "vingar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "virar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #60,870 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "vingar" and "virar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "vingar vs visar". 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 #60,870 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