cagadovscaladaTell them apart

Quick tell: cagado is a adjective, calada is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“cagado” is an adjective and “calada” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#15,296
“cagado” frequency rank
#45,176
“calada” frequency rank
60472
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cagado calada
Definition Que contiene excrementos. Acción y efecto de calar.

Where the eye mixes cagado and calada

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. cagado and calada follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
cagado
6 ch
calada

Why the eye confuses cagado with calada

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: cagado is [kaˈɣ̞að̞o] while calada is [kaˈlað̞a]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60472, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cagado is recorded at frequency rank #15,296, classified as anadj, pronounced [kaˈɣ̞að̞o]. calada is at rank #45,176, tagged as anoun, pronounced [kaˈlað̞a].

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 60472, this pair ranks #58,830 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of cagado vs calada

Shared letters: acd. Private to "cagado": go. Private to "calada": l.

"cagado" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "calada" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cagado ← acgado · caagdo · cagaddo · cagaod · cagdao · caggado · ccagado · cgaado
  • calada ← aclada · caalda · calaad · caladda · caldaa · ccalada · claada

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cagado" and "calada" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cagado" is an adjective and "calada" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "cagado" vs "calada" - which ranks higher?
"cagado" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #15,296 in our Spanish list, against #45,176 for "calada". 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 "cagado" and "calada" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cagado" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "calada" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #58,830 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cagado" and "calada" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "calada vs carnada". 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 #58,830 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