deadvsdejóTell them apart

Quick tell: dead is a adjective, dejó is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dead” is an adjective and “dejó” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,749
“dead” frequency rank
#985
“dejó” frequency rank
12734
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dead dejó
Definition Muerto. Tercera persona del singular (él, ella, ello; usted, 2.ª persona) del pretérito perfecto simple de indicativo de dejar.

Where the eye mixes dead and dejó

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

4 ch
dead
4 ch
dejó

Visual trap between dead and dejó

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dead is /dɛd/ while dejó is [d̪eˈxo]. 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 verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12734, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dead is recorded at frequency rank #11,749, classified as anadj, pronounced /dɛd/. dejó is at rank #985, tagged as averb, pronounced [d̪eˈxo].

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 12734, this pair ranks #290,473 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of dead vs dejó

Shared letters: de. Private to "dead": a. Private to "dejó": .

"dead" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "dejó" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • deaddaed · ddead · deadd · deda

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "dead" for "dejó" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dead" is an adjective and "dejó" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "dead" or "dejó" show up more?
"dejó" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #985 in our Spanish list, against #11,749 for "dead". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "dead" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "dejó" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #290,473 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dead" and "dejó" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dead vs Deva". 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 #290,473 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