workvsworryTell them apart

Which to use

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

#6,253
“work” frequency rank
#38,960
“worry” frequency rank
45213
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature work worry
Definition trabalho preocupação

Letter map: work vs worry

Shared letters muted; letters that set work and worry apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

4 ch
work
5 ch
worry

Pair insight - work / worry

work and worry are indexed as a confusable Portuguese pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45213, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

work is recorded at frequency rank #6,253, classified as anoun. worry is at rank #38,960, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈwɜːri/.

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 45213, this pair ranks #20,184 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of work vs worry

Shared letters: orw. Private to "work": k. Private to "worry": y.

"work" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "worry" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • workowrk · wokr · workk · worrk · wrok · wwork
  • worryowrry · worryy · wory · woryr · wrory · wworry

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "work" and "worry" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "work" vs "worry" - which ranks higher?
"work" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,253 in our Portuguese list, against #38,960 for "worry". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pair "work" vs "worry" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "work" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "worry" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #20,184 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "work" and "worry" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "worm vs worry". 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 #20,184 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