Spanish accent marks: The only guide you’ll need
Alicia Fernández
• Feb 18, 2025
• 8 minutes
Updated Feb 18, 2025
Spanish accent marks, known as tildes in Spanish, are small diagonal lines that are written above vowels to indicate how a word should be pronounced (á, é, í, ó, ú). They can be very tricky and challenging for English speakers as they are not commonly used in English words except for borrowed terms like fiancé, café, résumé, or cliché. But don't worry! This article will introduce you to the types of accent marks, their rules and principles, and a little practice at the very end to test your knowledge.
Let’s get started!
Let’s take a look at the different types of stress words can have in Spanish and the rules for when to mark that stress with a written accent mark or tilde:
They are stressed on the last syllable and have an accent mark or tilde when they end in a vowel, N or S. For example: café (coffee), pared (wall), canción (song), corazón (heart), dormir (to sleep) .
¡Ojo! As you can see the words dormir and pared are considered palabras agudas because they are stressed on the last syllable; however, they do not carry a tilde because they do not end in a vowel or the letters N or S.
These words are stressed on the penultimate or second-last syllable and have an accent mark when they do not end in a vowel, N or S. For example: árbol (tree), carácter (character), sandía (watermelon), útil (useful), domingo (Sunday), imagen (image).
¡Ojo! All the above words are graves, meaning they are stressed on the second-last syllable. However, they only carry an accent mark when they do NOT end in a vowel or the letters N or S. The word domingo does NOT carry an accent mark because it ends in a vowel. Do not confuse stress with accent marks. The accent or tilde is the written mark. The stress is just the emphasis we give to a syllable in a word. All Spanish words have stress, but not all words have an accent mark or tilde.
Esdrújulas are Spanish words with greatest emphasis on the third-to-last syllable, and always have a tilde or accent mark.
For example: diálogo (dialogue), médico (doctor), página (page), película (movie), brújula (compass), cómetelo (eat it).
Sobreesdrújula words are stressed on a syllable before the third-to-last syllable: académicamente (academically), básicamente (basically), científicamente (scientifically), demuéstramelo (show me), estéticamente (aesthetically). There aren't many words in this category. They always have a tilde or accent mark.
In Spanish, words that only have one syllable or monosílabos are generally not stressed if they fulfill only one grammatical function. This is because the purpose of accent marks in Spanish is primarily to indicate which syllable should be stressed in words with multiple syllables.
However, monosyllabic words may carry an accent mark to distinguish them from other words that are spelled similarly or the same (homonym). An example is the word té, which means tea. The accent on the E distinguishes it from te, which is a pronoun (Te quiero).
Other examples of monosyllabic words with accent marks include dé (give), tú (you), sé (I know), él (he), and más (more). If we remove the accent marks, these words have a different meaning: de (preposition); tu (possessive); se (reflexive and indirect object pronoun); el (definite article).
In these cases, the accent mark does not affect the pronunciation. Instead, it clarifies the meaning of the word and avoids confusion with similar-looking words.
¡Ojo! These words are also called homonyms, which are words that are spelled or pronounced the same way as another word but have different meanings.
Question words and exclamatory words usually have accent marks to differentiate them from other words that are spelled the same way.
For example: cómo (how) versus como (as/like/I eat), or ¡qué! (what!) versus que (that/which/who).
Here are a few more examples:
¿Cómo te llamas? (What’s your name?)
Lucca es tan simpático como su padre. (Lucca is as friendly as his father.)
¿Dónde has puesto las llaves? (Where did you put the keys?)
Esta es la ciudad donde nací. (This is the city where I was born.)
¿Qué quieres hacer para tu cumpleaños? (What do you want to do for your birthday?)
¿Este es el libro que querías? (Is this the book [that] you wanted)
¿Cuándo nace el bebé? (When is the baby born?)
Cuando nazca el bebé, ya estará mi madre aquí. (When the baby is born, my mother will already be here.)
So to recap, cuándo, dónde, qué, cómo,... are question words or interrogatives, cuando, donde, como are relative adverbs, and que is a relative pronoun.
In Spanish there are 5 vowels: A, E, I, O, U. We can divide them into two groups:
-We have three strong vowels: A, E, O
-And we have two weak vowels: I, U
1. If we have two strong vowels together, they will always be broken into to two separate syllables: área (3 syllables), caer (2 syllables), caos (2 syllables), ahora (3 syllables, we ignore the H), geotérmico (5 syllables), etc. Separating two adjacent vowels into two syllables is called a hiatus. With strong vowels, this separation just occurs naturally in Spanish.
2. If we have either one strong + one weak vowel (the order doesn't matter) or two weak vowels together, they will be considered a single syllable: jaula (2 syllables), fui (1 syllable), traigo (two syllables), Europa (three syllables), tienes (2 syllables), ruido (2 syllables), etc. Combining two adjacent vowels into one syllable is called a diphthong. Again, with strong + weak vowels or weak + weak vowels this diphthong just occurs naturally in Spanish.
3. In many words that have a strong + a weak vowel together (and should be considered one syllable according to rule #2), we split these two adjacent vowels phonetically into two syllables (and, again, this just occurs naturally with certain words). We call this "unnatural" separation "breaking the diphthong". When that happens, we place an accent mark on top of the weak vowel: Caín (2 syllables), todavía (4 syllables), tenía (3 syllables), baúl (2 syllables), búho (2 syllables, we ignore the H).
The Spanish diaeresis is a diacritical mark consisting of two dots placed over the letter U (Ü). Its primary purpose is to ensure the U is pronounced distinctly in specific syllables, where it would otherwise be silent. In syllables gue and gui, the letter U typically remains unpronounced. However, when a diaeresis is added, it breaks this rule and makes the U audible. This only applies to gue and gui syllables, as the letter U is pronounced in all other letter combinations.
Here are some examples:
Guerra (war): The U is silent.
Agüero (omen): The diaeresis makes the U pronounced.
Guisantes (peas): The U is silent
Pingüino (penguin): The diaeresis makes the U pronounced.
You don't need to worry about Ü appearing after Q, as there are no Spanish words with qüe or qüi syllables.
Here are more words with the diaeresis: cigüeña (stork), lingüista (linguist), antigüedad (antiquity), bilingüe (bilingual), bilingüismo (bilingualism).
The virgulilla (~) found in the Spanish letter Ñ should not be mistaken for an accent mark. It’s an integral component of the letter itself, just as the dot in the letter I or the line in the letter T. The letter Ñ in a Spanish word represents a sound similar to the ny sound in the English word canyon or onion.
¡Ojo! The letter Ñ is part of the Spanish alphabet and goes right after the letter N. Here are some words with the letter that you may know already: campaña (campaign), compañía (company), año (year), añadir (to add), aliñar (to align), araña (spider), meñique (little finger), mañanas (mornings), añorar (to miss), costeño (coastal), cabaña (cabin), ceño (frown), España (Spain), enseñar (to teach), gruñido (growl), guiñar (to wink), moño (bun, ribbon), montaña (mountain), otoño (autumn, fall), muñeca (doll, wrist).
The Spanish accent mark system aims to clearly indicate the stressed syllable in all the Spanish words that have a spoken accent, also known as a prosodic accent. This system applies to every word in the Spanish vocabulary and is based on simple principles. It ensures that when you read or write in Spanish, you know which syllable to emphasize in each word:
a) Only stressed words can have an accent mark.
b) The accent mark system doesn't separate stressed and unstressed words.
c) Accent mark rules apply to individual written words.
d) The accent mark system shows the main or primary accent of written words.
e) Each word can only have one tilde or accent.
f) Tildes are written over vowels.
g) A tilde on a vowel shows which syllable has the word's stress or emphasis.
h) To use accent mark rules, first divide words into syllables (palabra: pa - la -bra)
i) The system has rules to decide how vowel sequences are written.
j) The accent mark system doesn't show if a vowel sequence is spoken as one or more syllables.
k) The accent mark system follows the principle of simplicity.
l) Each word stress matches one written accent mark, and vice versa.
Conclusion
¡Por fin! We’ve reached the end! Mastering Spanish accent marks is an essential aspect of learning and using the language effectively. These small diacritical marks may seem challenging at first, but with dedication and practice, you can quickly become comfortable using them. Understanding the significance of tildes in distinguishing between words, their impact on pronunciation, and the rules associated with them can help you communicate clearly and confidently in Spanish. The best way to learn them is to learn the rules, read a lot, and learn the words with the accent mark so when you see a word like camara, you know there’s an accent missing on the first A: cámara. Remember, these little symbols can seem insignificant but they can make a big difference! (papa, potato; papá, dad; sí, yes; si, if). Ready to practice what you learned?
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Answer key
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Answer key
Alicia Fernández is a content writer at Berges Institute.
