Neutral Spanish, commonly referred to as Standard Spanish, Global Spanish or Universal Spanish, is a variation of the Spanish language used to allow the majority of Spanish speakers to understand the message without the use of local terminology and certain verb tenses

Standard Spanish is a different lect on its own, that has some absent tenses that are not to be found in other linguistic varieties; for example, certain verbal tenses (e.g. the future perfect tense) have virtually disappeared from the normal dialects, and survive only in Standard Spanish. The difficulty of perceiving the distinction is in part due to the strong centralized and prescriptive tradition of the Real Academia Española, whose normative rules relating to grammar and style have historically dominated written, legal and academic language, but also to the fact that Standard Spanish is not a geographically or regionally defined dialect, but a variant that many speakers use more or less regularly along with their own dialects, in formal situations or in the written language.

Mastery of Standard Spanish is frequently a socially important requirement to correctly perform some prestigious professions and activities, such as liberal arts, teaching or media.

Commonly, neutral Spanish is used in communications for commercial or marketing purposes, which means exporting certain products without having to localize them. For example, its use is quite common in telenovelas, where the actors are generally asked to neutralize the Spanish and their accent.