ir vs isa, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#186
“ir” frequency rank: #17,738
“isa” frequency rank: 17924
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	ir	isa
Definition	Desplazarse de un lugar a otro.	Estilo musical vocal, en ritmo de tres cuartos, típico de las Islas Canarias.

Where the eye mixes ir and isa

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

2 ch

3 ch

isa

Look-alike desk: ir vs isa

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ir is [ˈiɾ] while isa is [ˈisa]. 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 17924, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ir is recorded at frequency rank #186, classified as averb, pronounced [ˈiɾ]. isa is at rank #17,738, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈisa].

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 17924, this pair ranks #270,062 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ir vs isa

Shared letters: i. Private to "ir": r. Private to "isa": as.

"ir" · 2 letters · shape VC · "isa" · 3 letters · shape VCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ir" and "isa" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ir" is a verb and "isa" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary Spanish text, does "ir" or "isa" show up more?

"ir" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #186 in our Spanish list, against #17,738 for "isa". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

Full dictionary entry for "ir" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "isa" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #270,062 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"ir" and "isa" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "isa vs iza". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #270,062 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.