widevswildWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#27,068
“wide” frequency rank
#17,846
“wild” frequency rank
44914
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wide wild
Definition Ancho. Salvaje.

Where the eye mixes wide and wild

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

4 ch
wide
4 ch
wild

Visual trap between wide and wild

A purely visual mix-up. wide (/waɪd/) and wild ([vɪlt]) 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 44914, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wide is recorded at frequency rank #27,068, classified as anadj, pronounced /waɪd/. wild is at rank #17,846, tagged as anadj, pronounced [vɪlt].

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 44914, this pair ranks #134,397 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of wide vs wild

Shared letters: diw. Private to "wide": e. Private to "wild": l.

"wide" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "wild" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wide ← iwde · wdie · widde · wied · wwide
  • wild ← iwld · widl · wildd · willd · wlid · wwild

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "wide" for "wild" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/waɪd/ versus [vɪlt]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "wide" or "wild" show up more?
"wild" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,846 in our Spanish list, against #27,068 for "wide". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "wide" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wild" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #134,397 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "wide" and "wild" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wide vs wife". 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 #134,397 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