Spanish Vocabulary

Spanish has many Arabic-derived words due to centuries of Moorish influence, especially in everyday and technical vocab. Common examples include ojalá ("hopefully"), azúcar ("sugar"), aceite ("oil"), alfombra ("carpet"), almohada ("pillow"), naranja ("orange"), guitarra ("guitar"), barrio ("neighborhood"), almacén ("warehouse"), and alcalde ("mayor"). You’ll often spot the al- prefix from Arabic articles.

Use spaced repetition (apps like Anki) for daily review, and pair it with active recall: speak, write short journals, and make mini dialogues using new words. Read graded readers, subtitles, and news to see vocabulary in context. You can try more fanciful things like theming your weeks (food, travel, work), where you track 10 to 20 target words, and recycle them in conversations to cement them. Nothing makes a word stick more than regular use.

Cognates are your friends: hospital, animal, idea, color, doctor, problema, interesante, restaurante, teléfono, música, familia, and turismo. Especially with recent words, there's a lot of exchange between Spanish and English. Beware false friends like embarazada ("pregnant," not “embarrassed”), actual ("current," not “actual”), and éxito ("success," not “exit”). Pronunciation can differ, but recognition will give you a quick comprehension boost.

Yes. Most nouns are either masculine (often ending in -o) or feminine (often ending in -a), and articles and adjectives agree (el libro rojo, la casa roja). There are exceptions (la mano is feminine; el día is masculine), and some nouns vary by meaning (el capital vs. la capital). For an English speaker, this is a pretty tricky thing to master, and the best tip we have is always learning a noun with its associated article.

Many do. Spanish uses written accent marks to show stress or distinguish meanings: papá ("dad") vs. papa ("potato"); sí ("yes") vs. si ("if"). Accents also mark irregular stress (café, canción) and are mandatory in proper spelling.

In standard Spanish orthography, a single standalone word almost never carries two written accent marks. Even in compound words, Spanish typically keeps only one written accent based on the final stress rules after compounding (e.g., decimoséptimo has one accent). Cases with two accent marks usually appear only across multiple words (e.g., qué día) or in hyphenated forms where each part keeps its original accent (rare and mostly stylistic). Within a single, non-hyphenated Spanish word, two accents are effectively nonexistent.