pesadovspétaloWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: pesado is a adjective, pétalo is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“pesado” is an adjective and “pétalo” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#4,736
“pesado” frequency rank
#48,632
“pétalo” frequency rank
53368
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pesado pétalo
Definition Que pesa mucho. Hoja modificada que forma parte de la corola de una flor

Where the eye mixes pesado and pétalo

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. pesado and pétalo follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
pesado
6 ch
pétalo

Visual trap between pesado and pétalo

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pesado is [peˈsað̞o] while pétalo is [ˈpet̪alo]. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53368, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pesado is recorded at frequency rank #4,736, classified as anadj, pronounced [peˈsað̞o]. pétalo is at rank #48,632, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈpet̪alo].

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 53368, this pair ranks #88,232 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pesado vs pétalo

Shared letters: aop. Private to "pesado": des. Private to "pétalo": lté.

"pesado" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "pétalo" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pesado ← epsado · peasdo · pesaddo · pesaod · pesdao · pessado · ppesado · pseado

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "pesado" for "pétalo" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pesado" is an adjective and "pétalo" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "pesado" or "pétalo"?
"pesado" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,736 in our Spanish list, against #48,632 for "pétalo". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "pesado" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pétalo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #88,232 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pesado" and "pétalo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pétalo vs petar". 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 #88,232 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