súbitovssumidoWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: súbito is a adjective, sumido is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“súbito” is an adjective and “sumido” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#37,342
“súbito” frequency rank
#27,023
“sumido” frequency rank
64365
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature súbito sumido
Definition Que ocurre rápidamente y con poca o ninguna advertencia. Participio de sumir.

Where the eye mixes súbito and sumido

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

6 ch
súbito
6 ch
sumido

Look-alike desk: súbito vs sumido

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: súbito is [ˈsuβ̞it̪o] while sumido is [suˈmið̞o]. 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 verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 64365, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

súbito is recorded at frequency rank #37,342, classified as anadj, pronounced [ˈsuβ̞it̪o]. sumido is at rank #27,023, tagged as averb, pronounced [suˈmið̞o].

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 64365, this pair ranks #45,809 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of súbito vs sumido

Shared letters: ios. Private to "súbito": btú. Private to "sumido": dmu.

"súbito" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "sumido" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sumido ← smuido · ssumido · suimdo · sumdio · sumiddo · sumiod · summido · usmido

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "súbito" for "sumido" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "súbito" is an adjective and "sumido" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "súbito" or "sumido"?
"sumido" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #27,023 in our Spanish list, against #37,342 for "súbito". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "súbito" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sumido" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #45,809 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "súbito" and "sumido" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "subís vs súbito". 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 #45,809 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