I’ve used it referring to the ground level too. Others as well. Not common, but no one would wonder what you’d be talking about. It would be better to call it a terraço, but it would be neither here nor there.
In my region [Brazil] "varanda" corresponds to the en-US "porch".
Why would people downvote a comment like this? Varanda in Brazil means "porch" indeed.
Baranda (derived from varanda) in Bengali means porch too!