Locale Es Us

Reference data for the Spanish (United States) locale — endonym Español (Estados Unidos), written in the Latin script, left-to-right (LTR).

Identifiers

• BCP 47 tag: es-US
• ISO 639-1: es
• ISO 639-3: spa
• Script: Latn (Latin)
• Region: US (United States)
• Text direction: ltr — left-to-right (LTR)

Speakers (approximate)

• L1 (native): 41,000,000
• L2 (additional): 15,000,000
• L1+L2 (total): 56,000,000

Base locale

This is a regional variant of Locale Es 001 (Spanish), the base/macro locale for this language.

Pluralization

CLDR plural categories for this locale: one, many, other (3 forms).

• one — n = 1 (e.g. 1)
• many — e = 0 and i != 0 and i % 1000000 = 0 and v = 0 or e != 0..5 (e.g. 1000000, …)
• other — everything else (e.g. 0, 2~16, 100, 1000, …)

See Unicode Messageformat for writing plural messages using these categories.

Translating into this locale

Start from the general Spanish guidance in Locale Es 419 (grammar, register, and typography) and apply the following United States-specific points.

• Audience: a mix of heritage speakers of Mexican, Caribbean, Central American, and South American origin, many bilingual. Aim for neutral Latin American vocabulary and avoid Spain-only words and strong regional slang.
• Address: "tú" for consumer content is common, with "usted" for legal, health, and government text; plural is "ustedes".
• Loan and calque risks: avoid Spanglish forms such as "aplicar para" (for "solicitar"), "llamar para atrás" (for "devolver la llamada"), and "correr para" (for "postularse"). Use "solicitar", "devolver la llamada", and "postularse".
• Formats: decimal point and comma thousands separator in US-aligned content, dollar sign before the amount, month-day-year dates are common in US institutions (state clearly which you use), and US measurement units may stay with metric equivalents if needed.
• Local terms: keep proper names of US programs and agencies in English with a Spanish gloss on first use ("Seguro Social (Social Security)").

Common pitfalls

• Writing Spanglish calques ("aplicar para", "llamar para atrás") or using Spain-only vocabulary.
• Leaving US-specific institutions untranslated with no gloss.
• The general pitfalls in Locale Es 001 (word order, capitalization, false friends, and agreement) also apply here.

Learn more

• Locale for BCP 47 identifiers, locale-sensitive formatting, pluralization, and text-direction concepts that apply across all locales.
• Unicode Messageformat for writing plural/selection messages correctly for this locale's grammar.
• Real Academia Española and ASALE, Diccionario panhispánico de dudas and Ortografía de la lengua española (2010), https://www.rae.es
• Microsoft Localization Style Guide, Spanish (US): https://aka.ms/spanish-us-styleguide