Which to use
“había” is a verb and “hábil” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #117
- “había” frequency rank
- #11,594
- “hábil” frequency rank
- 11711
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | había | hábil |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Primera persona del singular (yo) del pretérito imperfecto de indicativo de haber. | Que puede hacer muy bien algo. |
Where the eye mixes había and hábil
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: había is [aˈβ̞ia] while hábil is [ˈaβ̞il]. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11711, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
había is recorded at frequency rank #117, classified as averb, pronounced [aˈβ̞ia]. hábil is at rank #11,594, tagged as anadj, pronounced [ˈaβ̞il].
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 11711, this pair ranks #294,152 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of había vs hábil
Shared letters: bh. Private to "había": aí. Private to "hábil": ilá.
"había" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV · "hábil" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC