Common Spanish vocabulary organised by first letter, each word with its English meaning. Built for learners and teachers rather than as a dictionary dump — these are words you will actually meet.
Letter pages are not built yet. These lists need a real Spanish–English vocabulary source with genders, and machine-translating an English word list would produce pages that are wrong in ways learners would immediately spot. Source the vocabulary first, then add the letter pages — there is a note about this in PUBLISH-CHECKLIST.md.
How to use these lists
Letter-by-letter vocabulary is how most Spanish courses and classroom displays are organised, which is why people look for it this way. Each page gives the Spanish word, its English meaning, and its gender where it is a noun — because getting el or
la wrong is the mistake learners make most.
The letters that behave differently
| Letter | What to know |
|---|---|
| H | Silent in Spanish. Hola is pronounced “ola”. |
| J | A throaty sound, closer to the English H in “hue”. |
| K | Almost entirely loanwords — kilo, karate, kiwi. |
| LL | Usually a Y sound. Was its own letter until 1994. |
| Ñ | Its own letter, sounds like the “ny” in canyon. |
| W | Only in borrowed words — whisky, web, waterpolo. |
| Z | An S sound in Latin America, a “th” sound in most of Spain. |
These lists are being built letter by letter. Each one is written and checked rather than machine-translated, so they go up gradually. If a letter you need is not live yet, it is on the way.
Related
Positive wordsEncouraging English vocabulary, hand-picked.
Random word generatorRandom English words with meanings.
Questions
Are the Spanish translations reliable?
Each word is listed with its English meaning and its gender where relevant. These are common everyday words rather than a full dictionary, chosen so learners get vocabulary they will actually use.
Why does Spanish have so few words starting with K and W?
Both letters are essentially borrowed. Native Spanish words almost never use them, so the words you find are loanwords from English, German or Japanese — kilo, kiwi, whisky.
What about Ñ, LL and CH?
Ñ is its own letter in Spanish and has its own short list. LL and CH were treated as separate letters until 1994 and you will still see them listed that way in older dictionaries.