les

[les]

/[les]/ pron

The verdict

“les” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #101) as a pronoun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.

#101
frequency rank, Spanish
2,069
“L” headwords
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Forma del dativo de ellos. Dativo del pronombre personal de tercera persona en género masculino o femenino y número plural. No admite preposición y se puede usar como sufijo: LES di; daLES. Es grav...

Corpus desk

Index ES-les · les · Spanish

les · rank #101 · 0 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-CORE #101
  • LEN-MID 3 letters
  • VOW-1 1 vowel
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 2,069
  • PHOTO-FINISH año

Nearest frequency peer: año (-1 rank slots)

Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.

Vecinos de frecuencia del confusable “les”

Pares de peso similar en el corpus, aparte de los confusables abajo

corpus weight

What this shows Las barras sitúan “les” frente a los lemas españoles más cercanos por rango, no un reprint del escritorio de confusables.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

les vs lo
33% similar
les vs li
33% similar
les vs Lu
0% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for les
PropertyValue
Headwordles
LanguageSpanish
Part of speechPronoun
IPA[les]
Letters3
Frequency rank#101
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Rango de corpus junto a confusables de “les”

La frecuencia va del puñado de palabras que usamos sin parar (izquierda) a la cola larga que apenas aparece (derecha).lescae aquí:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Los ticks avanzan en logaritmo; cada uno es del orden de diez veces más raro. En la misma franja de rareza aparecen “año” (#100), “otro” (#103), “va” (#98). Entre 2,069 lemas con “L”, “les” va en #101. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Easy to mix with look-alikes

The spelling risk for les is neighbouring look-alikes ("lo", "li", …), not just typos; it is apronoun pronounced [les]. Frequency #101 among 2,069 “L” headwords. Gloss: "Forma del dativo de ellos. Dativo del pronombre personal de tercera persona en género masculino o femenino y número plural. No admite preposición y se puede usar como sufijo: LES di; daLES. Es grav...".

les has no tracked misspelling variants, a sign its spelling follows regular Spanish conventions. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "lo", "li", "Lu", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct Spanish form is les, spelled L-E-S.

Definition

  1. 1
    Forma del dativo de ellos. Dativo del pronombre personal de tercera persona en género masculino o femenino y número plural. No admite preposición y se puede usar como sufijo: LES di; daLES. Es grave incorrección emplear en este caso para el género masculino la forma los, propia del acusativo, y en femenino tampoco debe emplearse la forma las, aunque lo hayan hecho escritores de nota.

Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 Spanish corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "les"?
"les" is spelled L-E-S. The IPA pronunciation is [les].
What does "les" mean?
As a pronoun, "les" means: Forma del dativo de ellos. Dativo del pronombre personal de tercera persona en género masculino o femenino y número plural. No admite preposición y se puede usar como sufijo: LES di; daLES. Es grav...
What words are commonly confused with "les"?
"les" is commonly confused with "lo", "li", "Lu". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "les"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "les" is [les]. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "les" come from?
"les" is a Spanish word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar Spanish words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "les", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked Spanish headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list