Spanish word of the week: fuerte

This week’s Spanish word of the week is fuerte ADJECTIVE strong; loud; intense

Fuerte is very common in Spanish. The commonest words in any language tend to have very many meanings, and fuerte is no exception. Today we’re looking at three of its major meanings, strong, loud and intense.

Es el hombre más fuerte del mundo. He’s the strongest man in the world.

Es una bebida muy fuerte.  It’s a very strong drink.

Apart from literal physical strength, fuerte can apply to many of the other things to which strong applies in English:

El dólar ha sido tradicionalmente una moneda fuerte. The dollar has traditionally been a strong currency.

el punto fuerte de este plan the strong point of this plan

un olor muy fuerte a very strong smell

When talking about sounds, fuerte is also at the top of scale, meaning loud:

No me gusta la música muy fuerte. I don’t like really loud music.  

Fuerte also often applies to un dolor, a pain, when the translation can be either intense or bad:

Comenzó a sentir fuertes dolores en el vientre.  She started to feel intense pain in her stomach.

Come back next week for another insight into Spanish vocabulary!