Close to 600 million people speak Spanish, around 500 million of them as a mother tongue, across Spain, most of Latin America and a growing part of the United States. Two things are true of all of them. They understand each other: a Bogotá lawyer, a Seville shopkeeper and a Buenos Aires taxi driver can hold a conversation without effort. And they sound different: in the way they pronounce s and z, in how fast they speak, in whether they say tú, vos or usted, and in the everyday words for a car, a computer or a cup of coffee.
This guide covers the main accents of Spain and Latin America, Spain’s other languages, and what all of it means for someone learning Spanish in London.
Why Spanish sounds so different from place to place
Spanish is the Latin of the Iberian peninsula, shaped over a thousand years and standardised as the language of Castile, which is why the names Spanish and Castilian are used for the same thing. It crossed the Atlantic in 1492 and over the next three centuries spread from California to Patagonia. The settlers came largely from Andalusia and the Canary Islands, and they took their pronunciation with them: that is why Latin American Spanish shares so many features with the south of Spain rather than the north.
Spelling and grammar have been regulated by the Royal Spanish Academy since 1713, so written Spanish is the same everywhere. The differences live in the sound, the vocabulary and a handful of grammatical habits, much as they do between British, Irish, American and Australian English.
The accents of Spain
Castilian, the Spanish of the north and centre and of the national broadcasters, is what most textbooks teach. Its signature is the distinction between s and the z or soft c, which sound like the th in “think”: cerveza is ther-ve-tha. It uses vosotros for “you” in the plural, and its vocabulary is the one Latin Americans think of as Spanish from Spain: ordenador for a computer, coche for a car, vale for OK.
Andalusian, spoken by the eight million people of the south and in Gibraltar, Ceuta and Melilla, is the accent of flamenco and of most Spanish holidays. Here s, z and soft c usually all sound like s; the s at the end of a syllable softens to a breath or vanishes, so los amigos becomes loh amigo; and in the west ustedes replaces vosotros. Every one of those features travelled to the Americas.
The Canary Islands sit between the two. Their Spanish drops the th sound and uses ustedes, and to a Latin American ear it is the most familiar accent in Spain, closest of all to the Caribbean.
Spain’s other languages
Alongside Spanish, Spain has several languages of its own. They are often called dialects, but they are languages in their own right, with their own literature, and co-official in the regions where they are spoken.
Catalan is a Romance language spoken by around ten million people in Catalonia, Valencia, where it is called Valencian, the Balearic Islands and Andorra, where it is the sole official language. It was the language of the medieval Crown of Aragon and of a rich literature, was banned from public life under Franco, and has flourished again since the return of democracy. In Barcelona you will hear it everywhere, and a few words of it are appreciated, but Spanish is understood by everyone.
Galician, in the north-west, is a close relative of Portuguese; speakers of the two understand each other. It is the first language of most of the region’s two and a half million people, and Galicia keeps a culture with a Celtic flavour, bagpipes included.
Basque, or Euskara, is unlike anything else in Europe: a language isolate, related to no other known language and older than Latin in the peninsula. Around three quarters of a million people speak it, on both sides of the Pyrenees. A standard form, Euskara Batua, was agreed in the 1960s so that speakers of its very different local varieties could share schools and broadcasting.
Aranese is a variety of Occitan, the old language of southern France, spoken in the Val d’Aran in the Catalan Pyrenees and official in Catalonia since 2010. Its road signs are the first thing visitors notice: the valley’s capital is Vielha, not Viella. Asturian and Aragonese, both descended from Latin, survive in the mountains of the north and are protected, though not official.
The accents of Latin America
Mexican Spanish is the Spanish of more speakers than any other country, and thanks to Mexican television, film and music it is the accent the rest of the Spanish-speaking world hears most. It is clearly enunciated, fond of diminutives (ahorita, un cafecito) and full of words borrowed from Nahuatl, from chocolate and tomate to chapulín.
Caribbean Spanish, spoken in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and along the Colombian coast, is the fastest and, for learners, the hardest to follow. Final consonants disappear, s becomes a breath, and in Puerto Rico r often turns into l: puerta sounds like puelta.
Andean Spanish, in the interior of Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia, is the opposite: measured, with every consonant sounded, which is why the Spanish of Bogotá is so often called the clearest in the world and the easiest for a learner to use.
Rioplatense Spanish, the accent of Buenos Aires and Montevideo, has Italian intonation from a century of immigration, pronounces ll and y as sh, so that ella becomes eh-sha, and uses vos rather than tú. Argentinian Spanish is the most distinctive accent in the language, and Argentinians are rather proud of it.
Chilean Spanish is quick, clipped and full of its own slang, from po at the end of every sentence to cachai for “you know?”. Chileans themselves joke that nobody else understands them. Vos is also standard in Paraguay and across much of Central America, from Costa Rica to Guatemala.
The United States belongs on this map too. With well over forty million Spanish speakers, it has a larger Spanish-speaking population than most countries in Latin America, and its Spanish is largely Mexican and Caribbean in origin.
What this means for a learner
The variety can sound daunting. In practice it is good news, for three reasons.
First, you only have to learn one Spanish. The grammar and the written language are the same everywhere, and a neutral, standard Spanish is understood from Madrid to Santiago. Someone who has learned in London and arrives in Mexico City or Buenos Aires will be understood from the first day; only the listening takes adjusting.
Second, the adjustment is a matter of exposure, not of study. A few hours of Cuban music or an Argentinian series with subtitles, and the dropped s or the sh stops being a puzzle. If you find that Spanish speakers seem to speak too fast, it is almost always the accent you are unused to, not the speed.
Third, your own accent can be chosen. If you are moving to Latin America for work, or you have family in Andalusia, a native-speaker tutor can teach you the pronunciation and vocabulary of that region from the start, and Spanish pronunciation is regular enough that the switch is small. With a private Spanish tutor the syllabus is yours, so the accent can be too.
Questions learners ask
Which Spanish accent is easiest to understand? The Andean accents of Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, and the Castilian of central Spain: both are slow and clear, with every consonant sounded.
Do I need to learn a specific accent? Only if you have a specific country in mind. Standard Spanish serves everywhere; a regional accent is an option, not a requirement.
Will Spanish from Spain be understood in Latin America, and the other way round? Yes, completely. The differences are far smaller than those between, say, Portuguese from Portugal and Brazil. Some everyday words differ, and Latin Americans will notice vosotros, but nothing gets in the way of a conversation.
What about working across several countries? That is the one case where accent training pays for itself. A team that deals with Madrid one day and Mexico City the next benefits from hearing both, which is how we build business Spanish training for companies with clients across the Spanish-speaking world.
Working with Spanish-speaking clients in several countries? Business Spanish training prepares you for the accents you will meet.
Read next: Colombian Spanish · Argentina and its distinctive Spanish accent · Is there a difference between Spanish and Castellano?