empresavsexpreseWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: empresa is a noun, exprese is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“empresa” is a noun and “exprese” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#431
“empresa” frequency rank
#20,033
“exprese” frequency rank
20464
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature empresa exprese
Definition Organismo compuesto por el trabajo y el capital como elementos de la producción, y ocupada en labores industriales, comerciales o de prestación de servicios, con fines de lucro. Primera persona del singular (yo) del presente de subjuntivo de expresar o de expresarse.

Where the eye mixes empresa and exprese

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. empresa and exprese follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCCCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
empresa
7 ch
exprese

Visual trap between empresa and exprese

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: empresa is [ẽmˈpɾesa] while exprese is [eksˈpɾese]. 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 (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 20464, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

empresa is recorded at frequency rank #431, classified as anoun, pronounced [ẽmˈpɾesa]. exprese is at rank #20,033, tagged as averb, pronounced [eksˈpɾese].

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 20464, this pair ranks #259,241 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of empresa vs exprese

Shared letters: eprs. Private to "empresa": am. Private to "exprese": x.

"empresa" · 7 letters · shape VCCCVCV  ·  "exprese" · 7 letters · shape VCCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • empresa ← emmpresa · empersa · emppresa · empreas · empressa · emprresa · emprsea · emrpesa
  • exprese ← epxrese · experse · expprese · exprece · exprees · expresse · exprrese · exprsee

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "empresa" and "exprese" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "empresa" is a noun and "exprese" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "empresa" or "exprese" show up more?
"empresa" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #431 in our Spanish list, against #20,033 for "exprese". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "empresa" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "exprese" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #259,241 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "empresa" and "exprese" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "exprese vs expuse". 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 #259,241 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