perdióvspericoWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#1,873
“perdió” frequency rank
#21,104
“perico” frequency rank
22977
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perdió perico
Definition Tercera persona del singular (él, ella, ello; usted, 2.ª persona) del pretérito perfecto simple de indicativo de perder o de perderse. Cualquier ave trepadora de la familia de los loros de tamaño pequeño o mediano.

Where the eye mixes perdió and perico

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
perdió
6 ch
perico

Visual trap between perdió and perico

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: perdió is [peɾˈð̞jo] while perico is [peˈɾiko]. 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 noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22977, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perdió is recorded at frequency rank #1,873, classified as averb, pronounced [peɾˈð̞jo]. perico is at rank #21,104, tagged as anoun, pronounced [peˈɾiko].

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 22977, this pair ranks #247,910 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of perdió vs perico

Shared letters: eipr. Private to "perdió": . Private to "perico": co.

"perdió" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "perico" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pericoeprico · peirco · pericco · perioc · perrico · pperico

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "perdió" and "perico" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "perdió" is a verb and "perico" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "perdió" or "perico"?
"perdió" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,873 in our Spanish list, against #21,104 for "perico". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "perdió" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "perico" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #247,910 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perdió" and "perico" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "perico vs Perseo". 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 #247,910 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