qua
/ˈkwa/
The verdict
“qua” is a moderately-common Spanish word, ranked #43,210 in Spanish word frequency and used as an adverb.
- #43,210
- frequency rank, Spanish
- 3
- letters
- 14
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Acá.
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 | qua |
| Language | Spanish |
| Part of speech | Adverb |
| IPA | /ˈkwa/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #43,210 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 14 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “qua” sits in Spanish frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The Spanish entry for qua is 3 letters long, classified as an adverb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈkwa/. Corpus data places it at rank #43,210 in overall Spanish word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Acá.".
Zero misspellings are on record for qua in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable Spanish rules. It also participates in 14 confusable-pair relationships, "que", "quo", "qui", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
No documented word history exists for this headword, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct Spanish form is qua, spelled Q-U-A.
Definition
- 1Acá.
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
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Using “qua”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct Spanish spelling is Q-U-A - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈkwa/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “que” - see the side-by-side comparison. qua vs que
- 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.