añovsapoWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“año” and “apo” are a confusable Spanish pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#100
“año” frequency rank
#44,553
“apo” frequency rank
44653
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature año apo
Definition Intervalo de tiempo que tarda la Tierra en hacer una revolución alrededor del Sol. El año se compone de 365 días y cuarto aproximadamente. Por eso cada cuatro años el año civil tiene un día más. Tarea.

Where the eye mixes año and apo

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

3 ch
año
3 ch
apo

Why the eye confuses año with apo

A purely visual mix-up. año ([ˈaɲo]) and apo (/aˈpo/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by a single letter - ñ in “año” becomes p in “apo”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44653, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

año is recorded at frequency rank #100, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈaɲo]. apo is at rank #44,553, tagged as anoun, pronounced /aˈpo/.

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 44653, this pair ranks #135,873 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of año vs apo

Shared letters: ao. Private to "año": ñ. Private to "apo": p.

"año" · 3 letters · shape VCV  ·  "apo" · 3 letters · shape VCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "año" and "apo" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently ([ˈaɲo] versus /aˈpo/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "año" or "apo" show up more?
"año" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #100 in our Spanish list, against #44,553 for "apo". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "año" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "apo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #135,873 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "año" and "apo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "apis vs apo". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #135,873 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