Spanish Question Words

Spanish interrogatives all carry a mandatory written accent. The accent is the marker that the word is a question word, not a relative pronoun. The same character without the accent (que, quien, cuando, donde) means something different.

The full set

Note: por qué is written as two words with an accent; porque (because) is one word with no accent. Mixing them is the most common spelling slip in beginner Spanish.

Word order in questions

Question word first, verb second, subject (if present) at the end.

• ¿Qué quieres? (What do you want?)
• ¿Dónde vive María? (Where does Maria live?)
• ¿Cuándo llega el tren? (When does the train arrive?)
• ¿Cómo se llama tu hermano? (What's your brother's name?)
• ¿Por qué no viniste? (Why didn't you come?)

Spanish doesn't insert an auxiliary the way English uses do / does / did. The question word leads, the verb follows, the subject (if it's not dropped) comes after the verb.

qué vs cuál

The single biggest source of question-word errors. The rule:

• Qué asks for a definition or a category. ¿Qué es esto? (What is this?) - tell me what kind of thing it is.
• Cuál asks for a choice from an implicit or explicit set. ¿Cuál prefieres? (Which do you prefer?) - pick one from the options.

Before a verb, cuál is usually right when choosing from options. Before a noun, qué is usually right.

• ¿Qué libro prefieres? (Which book do you prefer?) - qué before a noun
• ¿Cuál de los libros prefieres? (Which of the books do you prefer?) - cuál before de or a verb

The classic exceptions: ¿Cuál es tu nombre? (What's your name?) and ¿Cuál es tu dirección? (What's your address?). English uses "what" here, but Spanish reaches for cuál because it's asking you to identify the specific one from a set of possible names or addresses.

Variants and combinations

Several question words combine with prepositions.

• ¿De dónde eres? (Where are you from?)
• ¿Adónde vas? (Where are you going?) - "a + dónde" combines into adónde
• ¿De quién es esto? (Whose is this?)
• ¿Con quién hablas? (Who are you talking to?)
• ¿Para qué sirve? (What's it for?)
• ¿Por qué? (Why?)

The preposition always comes before the question word in Spanish. English allows preposition-stranding ("who are you talking to?"); Spanish does not - it's ¿con quién hablas?, never "¿quién hablas con?".

cuánto agreement

Cuánto agrees with the noun it modifies.

• ¿Cuánto cuesta? (How much does it cost?) - invariable when standing alone or with cost
• ¿Cuánto tiempo tienes? (How much time do you have?) - masculine singular
• ¿Cuánta agua quieres? (How much water do you want?) - feminine singular
• ¿Cuántos años tienes? (How old are you? - literally how many years)
• ¿Cuántas personas hay? (How many people are there?)

quién plural

Quién has a plural form quiénes for when the expected answer is plural.

• ¿Quién es? (Who is it?) - singular answer expected
• ¿Quiénes son? (Who are they?) - plural answer expected
• ¿Quién vino? (Who came?) - singular or unknown
• ¿Quiénes vinieron? (Who came? - plural answer expected)

Worked examples

• ¿Qué hora es? (What time is it?)
• ¿Cómo estás? (How are you?)
• ¿Dónde está el baño? (Where is the bathroom?)
• ¿Cuándo es tu cumpleaños? (When is your birthday?)
• ¿Quién llamó? (Who called?)
• ¿Cuántos hermanos tienes? (How many siblings do you have?)
• ¿Por qué estudias español? (Why do you study Spanish?)

Common mistakes English speakers make

Dropping the accent: writing que instead of qué in questions. The accent is mandatory and its absence is treated as a spelling error. Confusing por qué (why - two words) with porque (because - one word). Defaulting to qué when cuál is right: ¿qué es tu nombre? is wrong; it's ¿cuál es tu nombre?. And forgetting to move prepositions to the front: ¿con quién hablas?, not "¿quién hablas con?".

See also

• The Spanish word order page covers question word order as one of the five core divergences from English.
• The Spanish grammar cheatsheet covers the wider A1-B1 foundation.