vstuiTell them apart

Quick tell: is a noun, tui is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“té” is a noun and “tui” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#4,126
“té” frequency rank
#42,740
“tui” frequency rank
46866
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tui
Definition (Camellia sinensis) Arbusto de la famila de las cameliáceas, originario de Assam y de Bengala. Fue cultivado en China desde el siglo IV e introducido en Europa en el siglo XVI. Es perenne, de no más de 4 metros de altura, con hojas lanceoladas, ligeramente pubescentes, de hasta 15 centímetros de longitud y 5 de ancho. Las flores son blanco-amarillentas. Genitivo de la segunda persona singular.

Where the eye mixes té and tui

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

2 ch
té
3 ch
tui

Why the eye confuses té with tui

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: is [ˈt̪e] while tui is /ˈtu.iː/. 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 (noun vs pronoun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46866, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

is recorded at frequency rank #4,126, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈt̪e]. tui is at rank #42,740, tagged as apron, pronounced /ˈtu.iː/.

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 46866, this pair ranks #123,293 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of té vs tui

Shared letters: t. Private to "té": é. Private to "tui": iu.

"té" · 2 letters · shape CV  ·  "tui" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "té" for "tui" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "té" is a noun and "tui" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "té" or "tui"?
"té" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,126 in our Spanish list, against #42,740 for "tui". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "té" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tui" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #123,293 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "té" and "tui" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tui vs tul". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #123,293 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