Spanish double letter
The ~ accent, called a tilde, on the Spanish letter Ñ indicates that the word used to be spelled with two Ns but now the tilde stands in for the second one. Ñ is pronounced like the ni in onion.
It’s very important to include the tilde when writing or typing, because N and Ñ are two different letters. There are words that mean different things depending on whether the word is spelled and pronounced with N or Ñ. Also, Ñ has its own section of the dictionary which comes after the entire N section.
Por ejemplo…
| ñ | ||
| uña | fingernail | |
| baño | bathroom | |
| muñeca | wrist | |
| pañuelo | handkerchief |
Note that native Spanish speakers often refer to acute accents as tildes as well. I prefer to use different terms since the tilde (ñ) and the acute accent (á, é, etc) are different in both appearance and function.
Related features
- Letter: N
- Accents
- How to type accents
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