podíavspudraWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“podía” and “pudra” are a confusable Spanish pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#726
“podía” frequency rank
#35,210
“pudra” frequency rank
35936
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature podía pudra
Definition Primera persona del singular (yo) del pretérito imperfecto de indicativo de poder. Primera persona del singular (yo) del presente de subjuntivo de pudrir.

Where the eye mixes podía and pudra

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. podía (CVCVV) and pudra (CVCCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
podía
5 ch
pudra

Look-alike desk: podía vs pudra

A purely visual mix-up. podía ([poˈð̞ia]) and pudra ([ˈpuð̞ɾa]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 35936, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

podía is recorded at frequency rank #726, classified as averb, pronounced [poˈð̞ia]. pudra is at rank #35,210, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈpuð̞ɾa].

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 35936, this pair ranks #183,383 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of podía vs pudra

Shared letters: adp. Private to "podía": oí. Private to "pudra": ru.

"podía" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "pudra" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pudra ← pdura · ppudra · pudar · puddra · pudrra · purda · updra

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "podía" for "pudra" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([poˈð̞ia] versus [ˈpuð̞ɾa]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "podía" or "pudra" show up more?
"podía" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #726 in our Spanish list, against #35,210 for "pudra". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "podía" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pudra" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #183,383 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "podía" and "pudra" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pudra vs putea". 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 #183,383 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