tíasvstillWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: tías is a noun, till is a preposition, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“tías” is a noun and “till” is a preposition - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#15,243
“tías” frequency rank
#48,115
“till” frequency rank
63358
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tías till
Definition Forma del plural de tía. Hasta, hasta que, hasta la, hasta el.

Where the eye mixes tías and till

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence. tías (CVVC) and till (CVCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

4 ch
tías
4 ch
till

Visual trap between tías and till

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: tías is [ˈt̪ias] while till is /tɪl/. 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 (noun vs preposition), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63358, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tías is recorded at frequency rank #15,243, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈt̪ias]. till is at rank #48,115, tagged as aprep, pronounced /tɪl/.

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 63358, this pair ranks #49,011 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of tías vs till

Shared letters: t. Private to "tías": así. Private to "till": il.

"tías" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "till" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • till ← itll · tlil · ttill

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "tías" for "till" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tías" is a noun and "till" a preposition, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "tías" or "till" show up more?
"tías" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #15,243 in our Spanish list, against #48,115 for "till". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "tías" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "till" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #49,011 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tías" and "till" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tale vs till". 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 #49,011 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