Quinceañera is the Spanish feminine form of quinceañero and names a girl celebrating her fifteenth birthday.
The word is formed from quince, meaning “fifteen,” with the Spanish feminine ending associated with a female person or participant. In English, quinceañera can refer both to the celebrant and to the celebration itself.
Spanish distinguishes gender in many nouns describing people. Quinceañero is the masculine form, although quinceañera is much more widely recognized internationally because the tradition historically centered on girls. Boys’ fifteenth-birthday celebrations also exist and may be called quinceañeros in some communities.
The letter ñ is part of the standard spelling. Writing “quinceanera” without the tilde is common in places where keyboards lack Spanish characters, but the accented spelling is the conventional Spanish form. The term should not be confused with cumpleañera, which simply means a female birthday celebrant.