providavsprovistaWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: provida is a adjective, provista is a participle, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“provida” is an adjective and “provista” is a participle - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#39,944
“provida” frequency rank
#28,893
“provista” frequency rank
68837
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature provida provista
Definition Que está en contra del aborto. Forma del femenino de provisto, participio irregular de proveer o de proveerse.

Where the eye mixes provida and provista

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. provida runs 7 letters (CCVCVCV) against provista's 8 (CCVCVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
provida
8 ch
provista

Look-alike desk: provida vs provista

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: provida is [pɾoˈβ̞ið̞a] while provista is [pɾoˈβ̞ist̪a]. 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 (adjective vs participle), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68837, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

provida is recorded at frequency rank #39,944, classified as anadj, pronounced [pɾoˈβ̞ið̞a]. provista is at rank #28,893, tagged as aparticiple, pronounced [pɾoˈβ̞ist̪a].

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 68837, this pair ranks #33,500 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of provida vs provista

Shared letters: aioprv. Private to "provida": d. Private to "provista": st.

"provida" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCV  ·  "provista" · 8 letters · shape CCVCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • provida ← porvida · pprovida · probida · proivda · provdia · proviad · providda · provvida
  • provista ← porvista · pprovista · probista · proivsta · provisat · provissta · provistta · provitsa

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "provida" for "provista" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "provida" is an adjective and "provista" a participle, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "provida" or "provista"?
"provista" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #28,893 in our Spanish list, against #39,944 for "provida". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "provida" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "provista" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #33,500 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "provida" and "provista" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Poveda vs provida". 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 #33,500 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