construíanvsconstruidaConfusable pair

Quick tell: construían is a verb, construida is a participle, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“construían” is a verb and “construida” is a participle - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#45,221
“construían” frequency rank
#7,529
“construida” frequency rank
52750
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature construían construida
Definition Tercera persona del plural (ellos, ellas; ustedes, 2.ª persona) del pretérito imperfecto de indicativo de construir. Forma del femenino de construido, participio de construir.

Where the eye mixes construían and construida

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 8 letters in sequence.

10 ch
construían
10 ch
construida

Visual trap between construían and construida

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: construían is [kõnsˈt̪ɾwiãn] while construida is [kõnsˈt̪ɾwið̞a]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs participle), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 52750, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

construían is recorded at frequency rank #45,221, classified as averb, pronounced [kõnsˈt̪ɾwiãn]. construida is at rank #7,529, tagged as aparticiple, pronounced [kõnsˈt̪ɾwið̞a].

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 52750, this pair ranks #91,196 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of construían vs construida

Shared letters: acnorstu. Private to "construían": í. Private to "construida": di.

"construían" · 10 letters · shape CVCCCCVVVC  ·  "construida" · 10 letters · shape CVCCCCVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • construidacconstruida · cnostruida · connstruida · consrtuida · consstruida · constriuda · constrruida · construdia

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "construían" for "construida" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "construían" is a verb and "construida" a participle, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "construían" or "construida" show up more?
"construida" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,529 in our Spanish list, against #45,221 for "construían". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "construían" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "construida" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #91,196 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "construían" and "construida" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "construían vs construirán". 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 #91,196 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