English Spelling Rules  

1. General Remarks

British spelling was largely standardised by the middle of the 18th century, and American variants established by the early 19th, but many spelling conventions were fixed by printers as early as 1500, and since various changes in pronunciation have occurred in the ensuing centuries, present-day pronunciation and spelling are often at variance. Also, the 'neutral' vowel sound of unstressed syllables gives no guidance as to spelling, which is usually determined by the origin of the word, and care must be taken with words containing unstressed syllables such as de-, di-, en-, in-, -par-, -per-. These notes cover a few of the more common difficulties: for other individual points of uncertainty, the main part of the dictionary should be consulted, e.g. for pairs of words distinguished by meaning, such as affect / effect, amend / emend, complement / compliment, enquire / inquire, its / it's, loath / loathe, stationary / stationery. The following words may be difficult to find if the spelling is not known: diphtheria, dissect, eczema, fuchsia, guerrilla, minuscule, necessary, ophthalmic, pejorative, semantics. Note that silent letters occur especially in the combinations gn-, kn-, mn-, pn-, ps-, pt-, rh-, and that words ending in vowels other than e often have irregular inflections. (For a discussion of hyphenation see Punctuation Page on the hyphen.)

2. i before e

For words pronounced with an 'ee' (/i:/) sound, the traditional rule 'i before e except after c' is fairly reliable. The exceptions are (a) seize (and seise), (b) either and neither (if you pronounce them that way; also heinous, inveigle), (c) Latin words such as prima facie, species, and superficies, and (d) words in which a stem ending in -e- is followed by a suffix beginning with -i-, e.g. caffeine, casein, codeine, plebeian, protein. Note that the syllable -feit is so spelt, e.g. in counterfeit, forfeit, surfeit, and that mischief is spelt like chief.

Words pronounced with an 'ay' (/e/) or long 'i' (//) sound generally have -ei-: e.g. beige, heinous, reign, veil, eiderdown, height, kaleidoscope. Words with other sounds follow no rules and must simply become familiar to the eye, e.g. foreign (related to reign), friend, heifer, leisure, Madeira, sieve, sovereign (like foreign), their, view, weir, weird.

3. Doubling consonants

When a suffix beginning with a vowel (such as -able, -ed, -er, -ing, or -ish) is added to a word ending in a consonant, the consonant is usually doubled if it is a single consonant preceded by a single vowel, and comes at the end of a stressed syllable. So controllable, dropped, permitted, bigger, abetter, trekking, beginning, transferring, reddish, forgotten, but sweated, sweeter, appealing, greenish (more than one vowel), planting (more than one consonant), balloted, happened, preferable, profiting, rocketing (not ending a stressed syllable). A secondary stress (not generally marked in this dictionary) is often sufficient to elicit a doubled consonant, e.g. caravanned, confabbed, diagrammed, formatted, humbugged, programmed, zigzagged, and (in British use) kidnapped, worshipped, though note invalided and (in British use) benefited. Other variable or exceptional verbs include brevet, canvas, carburet, coif, curvet, ricochet, target, tittup, and wainscot. Verbs ending in a vowel followed by -c generally form inflections in -cked, -cking, e.g. bivouac, mimic, picnic.

Derivative verbs formed by the addition of prefixes follow the pattern of the root verb, as in inputting, leapfrogging, outcropped, outfitting; note that benefit is not derived from fit, and the forms benefitted and benefitting are standard only in American English.

In British English, the letter l is doubled if it follows a single vowel, regardless of stress, e.g labelled, travelling, jeweller, but heeled, airmailed, coolish (more than one vowel). In American English the double l occurs only if ending a stressed syllable, e.g. labeled, traveling, jeweler in American use, but dispelled, gelled in both British and American use (the double l may be retained in the present tense in American use, e.g. appall, enthrall). Exceptions retaining single l: paralleled, devilish; exceptions having double l (in British use): woollen, woolly; note variability of cruel(l)er, cruel(l)est.

The letter s is not usually doubled before the suffix -es, either in plural nouns, e.g. focuses, gases, pluses, yeses, or in the present tense of verbs, e.g. focuses, gases. However, verbal forms in -s(s)ed, -s(s)ing are variable, and doubling only after stressed syllables is often preferable, e.g. gassing, nonplussed, but biased, focused, focusing. Variants are common: e.g. see bus. See also Forming plurals below.

The consonants h, w, x, and y are never doubled: hurrahed, guffawed, mower, boxing, stayed. Silent consonants are also never doubled: crocheting, précising.

4. Dropping silent e

A final silent e is usually dropped when adding a suffix begining with a vowel, e.g. bluish, bravest, continuous, queued, refusal, writing. Exceptions are noted below:

4.1 before -ing The e is retained in dyeing, singeing, swingeing, and (usually) routeing, to distinguish them from dying, singing, swinging, and routing. It is commonly retained in ageing, bingeing, blueing, clueing, cueing, twingeing, whingeing, and sometimes in glu(e)ing, hing(e)ing, ru(e)ing, spong(e)ing, ting(e)ing. It is also retained for words ending in -ee, -oe, -ye, e.g. canoeing, eyeing, fleeing, hoeing, shoeing, tiptoeing.

Otherwise it is dropped: charging, icing, lunging (but lungeing in the horse-training sense: see lunge2), staging, etc.

4.2 words ending in -ce or -ge The e is retained to preserve the sound of the consonant, e.g. advantageous, courageous, knowledgeable, noticeable, manageable, peaceable.

4.3 before -able The dropping of e before -able is very unpredictable, and the first (or only) spelling given in the main part of the dictionary should be preferred. The endings -ceable and -geable are usual, as mentioned above, and no letter is dropped in agreeable, foreseeable. The e is retained in probeable to distinguish it from probable. The e is more often dropped in American English.

4.4 before -age The e is usually dropped: cleavage, dosage, wastage. Exceptions: acreage, litreage, metreage (always), mil(e)age (optional). Note also that linage and lineage are different words.

4.5 before -y The e is usually dropped: bony, icy, grimy. Exceptions: (a) after u (gluey); (b) after g (cottagey, villagey, but optional in cag(e)y, stag(e)y); (c) after c (usual in dicey, optional in pric(e)y and spac(e)y, occasionally seen in pacy and spicy, but otherwise dropped, e.g. bouncy, chancy, fleecy, lacy, etc.). The e is retained in holey to distinguish it from holy, and an extra e is added to separate two ys, e.g. clayey. It may be retained or added for clarity in more unusual words, e.g. chocolatey, echoey.

A silent e is not usually dropped when adding a suffix beginning with a consonant, e.g. useful, homeless, safely, movement, whiteness, lifelike, awesome. Exceptions: argument, awful, duly, ninth, truly, wholly. When such a suffix is added to words ending in -dge, American English tends to drop the e, e.g. acknowledgment, fledgling, and this practice is sometimes seen in British English (notably in judgment, which is usual in legal contexts).

5. Forming plurals

5.1 Simple nouns. Regular plurals are formed by adding s, or after s, sh, ss, z, x, ch (unless pronounced 'hard') by adding es: books, boxes, pizzas, queues, arches, stomachs. An apostrophe should not be used. Nouns ending in -y preceded by a consonant (or -quy) form plurals ending in -ies, e.g. rubies, soliloquies, but boys, monkeys. Exceptions: laybys, stand-bys, most names (e.g. the Kennedys). Nouns ending in -f or -fe (not -ff, -ffe) may form plurals in -ves, either always (e.g. halves, leaves) or optionally (e.g. hooves, scarves), or may always have regular plurals (e.g. beliefs, chiefs); these should be checked in the main part of the dictionary. Nouns ending in -o or -i are variable and should be checked in the main part of a dictionary; a number of long-established English words have only plurals in -oes (e.g. heroes, potatoes, tomatoes) but plurals in -os are common, and are usual among words which are less naturalized (e.g. arpeggios), or are formed by abbreviation (e.g. kilos), or have a vowel preceding the -o (e.g. radios). Nouns ending in -ful form regular plurals in -fuls (see Usage Note at cupful). Only the letter z is regularly doubled in forming plurals: fezzes, quizzes, but gases, yeses (see Doubling consonants above). Nouns ending in -man form plurals in -men, e.g. chairmen, postmen, spokeswomen etc., but note caymans, dragomans, talismans, Turcomans. Other irregular plurals are noted in the main text of most dictionaries.

5.2 Compound nouns. Most compound nouns pluralise the last element: break-ins, forget-me-nots, major generals, man-hours, ne'er-do-wells, round-ups, sergeant majors, vice-chancellors. Exceptions include: (i) nouns followed by prepositional phrases, e.g. Chancellors of the Exchequer, commanders-in-chief, daughters-in-law, ladies-in-waiting, men-of-war, rights of way; (ii) nouns denoting persons, followed by adverbs, e.g. hangers-on, passers-by, runners-up; (iii) nouns followed by adjectives, e.g, battles royal, cousins german, heirs presumptive, notaries public, Governors-General (though terms in common use, especially if hyphenated, may not follow this rule, e.g. Secretary-Generals); (iv) nouns denoting persons and containing man or woman, which pluralize both elements, e.g. women doctors, menservants, gentlemen farmers.

5.3 Foreign and classical plurals. Words adopted into English generally form regular English plurals, but words not fully naturalised may form the plural as in the language of origin, e.g. bureaux, cherubim, lire, virtuosi. Many words of Greek and Latin origin retain classical plurals, though they may be used only in technical contexts, e.g. formulae, indices, stadia, topoi. In general, in forming classical plurals, -us becomes -i (occasionally -era or -ora); -a becomes -ae; -um and -on become -a; -ex and -ix become -ices; -nx becomes -nges; -is becomes -es or -ides; and -os becomes -oi. Note that many nouns regularly form only English plurals, e.g. agendas, censuses, irises, octopuses, omnibuses, phoenixes, thermoses. Care should be taken with words ending in -a, e.g. addenda, bacteria, criteria, phenomena, and strata are plural, but nebula and vertebra are singular.

6. Common suffixes

Several common suffixes occur in different forms which may cause spelling difficulties: users of the dictionary should be careful to check if unsure of accepted usage. The most frequent sources of uncertainty are as follows:

6.1 -able / -ible The suffix -ible is found only in a number of long-established words taken directly from Latin or modelled on these. Modern formations on English roots use -able (see also Dropping silent e above).

6.2 -ance / -ence (and -ant / -ent) These endings are largely dependent on the source of the word in Latin, and must be checked in the main part of the dictionary. Note especially currant / current and dependant / dependent.

6.3 -cede / -ceed The suffix -ceed occurs only in exceed, proceed, succeed; otherwise concede, intercede, precede, recede, etc. (note also supersede).

6.4 -ction / -xion The -x- is recommended only in complexion, crucifixion, effluxion, flexion, fluxion, prefixion, retroflexion, transfixion.

6.5 -er / -or The ending -or is found mainly in words of classical or French origin, especially in the combinations -ator, -ctor, -essor. It is also retained in legal use where -er is more usual, e.g. divisor. See also Usage Note at adviser.

6.6 -er / -re American spelling often uses -er for -re in words such as centre, fibre, theatre, etc., but not in acre, cadre, euchre, lucre, massacre, mediocre, ogre, and wiseacre. Note also the usage indicated in the entries for meter and metre in the main part of a dictionary.

6.7 -ia / -a In names of plants derived from Latin, both of these endings occur, but mispronunciation leads to confusion over names such as scilla, weigela (not 'scillia', 'weigelia'). Names not fully naturalised in English use must be checked in a reliable botanical source. See also Usage Note at aubrietia.

6.8 -ice / -ise In standard British use, licence and practice are nouns, license and practise are verbs; in American use the -ise form is used for both noun and verb. Note also the distinction between prophesy and prophecy.

6.9 -ise / -ize / -yse The verbal ending -ize has been in general use since the 16th century; it is favoured in American English and in much British writing, and remains the current preferred style of Oxford University Press in academic and general books published in Britain. However, the alternative spelling -ise is now widespread (partly under the influence of French), especially in Britain, and may be adopted provided that its use is consistent. A number of verbs always end in -ise in British use, notably advertise, chastise, despise, disguise, franchise, merchandise, surmise, and all verbs ending in -cise, -prise, -vise (including comprise, excise, prise (open), supervise, surprise, televise, etc.), but -ize is always used in prize (= value), capsize, size. Spellings with -yze (analyze, paralyze) are acceptable only in American use.

6.10 -our / -or Most words ending in -our in British use are spelt with -or in American use. However, British spelling often uses -or (e.g. error, stupor, tremor), and the u is dropped before some suffixes (e.g. coloration, honorary, vaporise, but note colourist, honourable, savoury). It is advisable to check such spellings in the dictionary.

7. ae and oe