pulga
[ˈpulɣ̞a]
The verdict
“pulga” is a moderately-common Spanish word, ranked #31,940 in Spanish word frequency and used as a noun.
- #31,940
- frequency rank, Spanish
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Pequeño insecto del orden Siphonaptera. Son parásitos externos que viven de la sangre. Sus patas posteriores contienen fibras de una proteína elástica que les permiten dar saltos enormes en relació...
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | pulga |
| Language | Spanish |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | [ˈpulɣ̞a] |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #31,940 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “pulga” sits in Spanish frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The Spanish entry for pulga is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as [ˈpulɣ̞a]. Corpus data places it at rank #31,940 in overall Spanish word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Pequeño insecto del orden Siphonaptera. Son parásitos externos que viven de la sangre. Sus patas posteriores contienen fibras de una proteína elástica que les permiten dar saltos enormes en relació...".
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for pulga, with forms such as "pluga", "ppulga", and "pugla". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "puta", "pura", "puma", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct Spanish form is pulga, spelled P-U-L-G-A.
Definition
- 1Pequeño insecto del orden Siphonaptera. Son parásitos externos que viven de la sangre. Sus patas posteriores contienen fibras de una proteína elástica que les permiten dar saltos enormes en relación a su tamaño.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: pluga,ppulga,pugla,pulag,pulgga,pullga,uplga
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of pulga - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 "pulga"?
What does "pulga" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "pulga"?
How do you pronounce "pulga"?
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Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “pulga”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct Spanish spelling is P-U-L-G-A - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as [ˈpulɣ̞a] (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “puta” - see the side-by-side comparison. pulga vs puta
- Browse more Spanish words and confusable pairs in the same reference. Spanish words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.