Which to use
“Ébola” is a name and “época” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #15,519
- “Ébola” frequency rank
- #796
- “época” frequency rank
- 16315
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | Ébola | época |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | (Ebolavirus) Virus causante de una enfermedad infecciosa, caracterizada por fiebre hemorrágica, que es altamente contagiosa y muy severa, afectatando a todo tipo de primates, incluidos los seres humanos y a otros mamíferos. | Fecha especial de algún suceso en el cual se comienzan a contar los años. |
Where the eye mixes Ébola and época
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. Ébola and época follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Why the eye confuses Ébola with época
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Ébola is [ˈeβ̞ola] while época is [ˈepoka]. 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 (name vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16315, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
Ébola is recorded at frequency rank #15,519, classified as aname, pronounced [ˈeβ̞ola]. época is at rank #796, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈepoka].
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 16315, this pair ranks #276,685 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of Ébola vs época
Shared letters: aoé. Private to "Ébola": bl. Private to "época": cp.
"Ébola" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV · "época" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "Ébola" for "época" ever safe?
In ordinary Spanish text, does "Ébola" or "época" show up more?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "Ébola" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "época" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #276,685 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "Ébola" and "época" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Ébola vs esboza". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #276,685 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.