cebavsceraTell them apart

Which to use

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

#49,502
“ceba” frequency rank
#9,952
“cera” frequency rank
59454
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ceba cera
Definition Alimentación abundante y esmerada que para que engorde se da al ganado, especialmente al que es comido por el ser humano. Se llama así a cualquier éster de los ácidos grasos con alcoholes de peso molecular elevado, es decir, son moléculas que se obtienen por esterificación de un ácido graso con un alcohol monovalente lineal de cadena larga. Por ejemplo la cera de abeja. Son sustancias altamente insolubles en medios acuosos y a temperatura ambiente se presentan sólidas y duras. En los animales la podemos encontrar en la superficie del cuerpo, piel, plumas. En vegetales las ceras recubren en la epidermis de frutos, tallos, junto con la cutícula o la suberina, que evitan la pérdida de agua por evaporación en las plantas.

Where the eye mixes ceba and cera

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
ceba
4 ch
cera

Visual trap between ceba and cera

A purely visual mix-up. ceba ([ˈseβ̞a]) and cera ([ˈseɾa]) 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 - b in “ceba” becomes r in “cera”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59454, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ceba is recorded at frequency rank #49,502, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈseβ̞a]. cera is at rank #9,952, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈseɾa].

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 59454, this pair ranks #62,558 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ceba vs cera

Shared letters: ace. Private to "ceba": b. Private to "cera": r.

"ceba" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "cera" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cebacbea · cceba · ceab · cebba · ceva · ecba · seba
  • ceraccera · cerra · ecra

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ceba" and "cera" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently ([ˈseβ̞a] versus [ˈseɾa]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "ceba" or "cera" show up more?
"cera" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,952 in our Spanish list, against #49,502 for "ceba". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ceba" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cera" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #62,558 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ceba" and "cera" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ceba vs Cova". 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 #62,558 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