adelantadavsadelantadoWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: adelantada is a participle, adelantado is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“adelantada” is a participle and “adelantado” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#28,618
“adelantada” frequency rank
#7,946
“adelantado” frequency rank
36564
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature adelantada adelantado
Definition Forma del femenino de adelantado, participio de adelantar o de adelantarse. Atrevido, que no guarda respeto ni atención.

Where the eye mixes adelantada and adelantado

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence. adelantada and adelantado follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCVCVCCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

10 ch
adelantada
10 ch
adelantado

Why the eye confuses adelantada with adelantado

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: adelantada is [að̞elãn̪ˈt̪að̞a] while adelantado is [að̞elãn̪ˈt̪að̞o]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - a in “adelantada” becomes o in “adelantado”, and the parts of speech differ too (participle vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36564, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

adelantada is recorded at frequency rank #28,618, classified as aparticiple, pronounced [að̞elãn̪ˈt̪að̞a]. adelantado is at rank #7,946, tagged as anadj, pronounced [að̞elãn̪ˈt̪að̞o].

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 36564, this pair ranks #179,974 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of adelantada vs adelantado

Shared letters: adelnt. Private to "adelantada": -. Private to "adelantado": o.

"adelantada" · 10 letters · shape VCVCVCCVCV  ·  "adelantado" · 10 letters · shape VCVCVCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • adelantadaaddelantada · adealntada · adelanatda · adelanntada · adelantaad · adelantadda · adelantdaa · adelanttada
  • adelantadoaddelantado · adealntado · adelanatdo · adelanntado · adelantaddo · adelantaod · adelantdao · adelanttado

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "adelantada" for "adelantado" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "adelantada" is a participle and "adelantado" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "adelantada" vs "adelantado" - which ranks higher?
"adelantado" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,946 in our Spanish list, against #28,618 for "adelantada". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "adelantada" and "adelantado" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "adelantada" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "adelantado" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #179,974 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "adelantada" and "adelantado" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "adelantada vs adelantadas". 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 #179,974 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list