escondíanvsescondidasConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#45,306
“escondían” frequency rank
#11,042
“escondidas” frequency rank
56348
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature escondían escondidas
Definition Tercera persona del plural (ellos, ellas; ustedes, 2.ª persona) del pretérito imperfecto de indicativo de esconder. Juego infantil en donde se elige a una persona para que cuente con los ojos cerrados mientras los demás se esconden. Luego, debe intentar encontrar y librar a quienes se escondieron.

Where the eye mixes escondían and escondidas

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. escondían runs 9 letters (VCCVCCVVC) against escondidas's 10 (VCCVCCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

9 ch
escondían
10 ch
escondidas

Visual trap between escondían and escondidas

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: escondían is [eskõn̪ˈd̪iãn] while escondidas is [eskõn̪ˈd̪ið̞as]. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56348, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

escondían is recorded at frequency rank #45,306, classified as averb, pronounced [eskõn̪ˈd̪iãn]. escondidas is at rank #11,042, tagged as anoun, pronounced [eskõn̪ˈd̪ið̞as].

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 56348, this pair ranks #74,996 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of escondían vs escondidas

Shared letters: acdenos. Private to "escondían": í. Private to "escondidas": i.

"escondían" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCCVVC  ·  "escondidas" · 10 letters · shape VCCVCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • escondidasecsondidas · esccondidas · escnodidas · escodnidas · esconddias · esconddidas · escondiads · escondidass

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "escondían" for "escondidas" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "escondían" is a verb and "escondidas" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "escondían" or "escondidas" show up more?
"escondidas" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,042 in our Spanish list, against #45,306 for "escondían". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "escondían" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "escondidas" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #74,996 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "escondían" and "escondidas" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "esconda vs escondían". 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 #74,996 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