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American and British English spelling differences are one aspect of American and British English differences.

Historical origins

In the early 18th century, English spelling was not standardised. Differences became noticeable after the publishing of influential dictionaries. Current British English spellings follow, for the most part, those of Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language (1755), whereas many American English spellings follow Noah Webster's An American Dictionary of the English Language of 1828.

Webster was a strong proponent of spelling reform for reasons both philological and nationalistic. Many spelling changes proposed in the United States of America by Webster himself, and in the early 20th century by the Simplified Spelling Board, never caught on. Among the advocates of spelling reform in England, the influences of those who preferred the Norman (or Anglo-French) spellings of certain words proved to be decisive. Subsequent spelling adjustments in the United Kingdom had little effect on present-day American spellings, and vice-versa. In many cases American English deviated in the 19th century from mainstream British spelling, but it has also retained some older forms.

The spelling systems of most Commonwealth countries and Ireland, for the most part, closely resemble the British system. In Canada, however, the preferred spellings include some American forms and some British, and Canadians are somewhat more tolerant of foreign forms.

Spelling and pronunciation

In a few cases, essentially the same word has a different spelling which reflects a different pronunciation. However, in most cases the pronunciation of the words is the same, or nearly so.

As well as the miscellaneous cases listed in the following table, the past tenses of some irregular verbs differ in both spelling and pronunciation, as with smelt (mainly in the UK) versus smelled (mainly American): see American and British English differences: Verb morphology.

Latin-derived spellings

-our, -or

Most words ending in an unstressed -our in the United Kingdom, Ireland, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, Australia and most other English-speaking countries (e.g., colour, flavour, honour, neighbour, rumour, labour) end in -or in the United States (e.g., color, flavor, honor, neighbor, rumor, labor). Wherever the vowel is unreduced in pronunciation, this does not occur: contour, velour, paramour, troubadour, are spelt thus the same everywhere. Most words of this category derive from Latin non-agent nouns having nominative -or; the first such borrowings into English were from early Old French and the ending was -or or -ur. After the Norman Conquest, the termination became -our in Anglo-French in an attempt to represent the Old French pronunciation of words ending in -or, though color has been used occasionally in English since the fifteenth century. The -our ending was not only retained in English borrowings from Anglo-French, but also applied to earlier French borrowings. After the Renaissance, some such borrowings from Latin were taken up with their original -or termination; many words once ending in -our (for example, chancellour and governour) now end in -or everywhere. Many words of the -our/-or group do not have a Latin counterpart; for example, armo(u)r, behavio(u)r, harbo(u)r, neighbo(u)r; also arbo(u)r meaning "shelter", though senses "tree" and "tool" are always arbor, a false cognate of the other word. Some 16th and early 17th century British scholars indeed insisted that -or be used for words of Latin origin (e.g. color) and -our for French loans; but in many cases the etymology was not completely clear, and therefore some scholars advocated -or only and others -our only.

Webster's 1828 dictionary featured only -or and is generally given much of the credit for the adoption of this form in the United States. By contrast, Dr Johnson's 1755 dictionary used the -our spelling for all words still so spelled in Britain, as well as for emperour, errour, governour, horrour, tenour, terrour, and tremour, where the u has since been dropped. Johnson, unlike Webster, was not an advocate of spelling reform, but selected the version best-derived, as he saw it, from among the variations in his sources: he favoured French over Latin spellings because, as he put it, "the French generally supplied us". Those English speakers who began to move across the Atlantic would have taken these habits with them and H L Mencken makes the point that, "honor appears in the Declaration of Independence, but it seems to have got there rather by accident than by design. In Jefferson’s original draft it is spelled honour." Examples such as color, flavor, behavior, harbor, or neighbor scarcely appear in the Old Bailey's court records from the 17th and 18th century, whereas examples of their -our counterparts are numbered in thousands. One notable exception is honor: honor and honour were equally frequent down to the 17th century, Honor still is, in the UK, the normal spelling as a person's name.

Derivatives and inflected forms. In derivatives and inflected forms of the -our/or words, in British usage the u is kept before English suffixes that are freely attachable to English words (neighbourhood, humourless, savoury) and suffixes of Greek or Latin origin that have been naturalised (favourite, honourable, behaviourism); before Latin suffixes that are not freely attachable to English words, the u may be dropped (honorific, honorist, vigorous, humorous, laborious, invigorate), may be either dropped or retained (colo(u)ration, colo(u)rise), or may be retained (colourist). In American usage, derivatives and inflected forms are built by simply adding the suffix in all environments (favorite, savory, etc.) since the u is absent to begin with.

Exceptions. American usage in most cases retains the u in the word glamour, which comes from Scots, not Latin or French. "Glamor" is occasionally used in imitation of the spelling reform of other -our words to -or. The adjective "glamorous" omits the first "u". Saviour is a somewhat common variant of savior in the United States. The British spelling is very common for "honour" (and "favour") in the stilted language of wedding invitations in the United States. The name of the Space Shuttle Endeavour has a u in it since this spacecraft was named after Captain James Cook's ship, HMS Endeavour.

The name of the herb savory is thus spelled everywhere, although the related adjective savo(u)ry, like savour, has a u in the UK. Honor (the name) and arbor (the tool) have -or in Britain, as mentioned above. As a general noun, rigour (/ˈrɪɡər/) has a u in the UK; the medical term rigor (often Template:Pron-en) does not. Words with the ending -irior, -erior or similar are spelled thus everywhere and have never had a "u", for example inferior or exterior.

Commonwealth usage. Commonwealth countries normally follow British usage. In Canada -or endings are not uncommon, particularly in Western Canada. In Australia, -or terminations enjoyed some use in the 19th century, and now are sporadically found in some regions, usually in local and regional newspapers, though -our is almost universal. New Zealand English, while sharing some words and syntax with Australian English, follows British usage.

-re, -er

In British usage, some words of French, Latin, or Greek origin end with a consonant followed by -re, with the -re unstressed and Template:Pron-en. Most of these words have the ending -er in the United States. The difference is most common for words ending -bre or -tre: British spellings centre, goitre, kilometre, litre, lustre, mitre, nitre, reconnoitre, saltpetre, spectre, theatre, and titre all have -er in American spelling, as do calibre, fibre, sabre, and sombre.

There are many exceptions to the -re spelling in British usage. Many words spelled with -re in Modern French are spelled with -er in both British and American usage; among these are chapter, December, diameter, disaster, enter, filter, letter, member, minister, monster, October, November, number, oyster, parameter, powder, proper, September, sober, and tender. There does not appear to be any pattern to the choice of the -er or -re spelling in British usage.

The ending -cre, as in acre, lucre, massacre, mediocre, is preserved in American English, to indicate the c is pronounced /k/ rather than /s/.

After other consonants, there are not many -re endings even in British English: louvre and manoeuvre after -v; meagre (but not eager) and ogre after -g; and euchre, ochre, and sepulchre after -ch. In the United States, ogre and euchre are standard; manoeuvre and sepulchre are usually spelled as maneuver and sepulcher; and the other -re forms listed are less used variants of the equivalent -er form.

The e preceding the r is retained in American-derived forms of nouns and verbs, for example, fibers, reconnoitered, centering, which are, naturally, fibres, reconnoitred and centring respectively in British usage. It is dropped for other inflections, for example, central, fibrous, spectral. However such dropping cannot be regarded as proof of an -re British spelling: for example, entry derives from enter, which has not been spelled entre for centuries.

The difference relates only to root words; -er rather than -re is universal as a suffix for agentive (reader, winner, user) and comparative (louder, nicer) forms. One consequence is the British distinction of meter for a measuring instrument from metre for the unit of length. However, while poetic metre is often -re, pentameter, hexameter, etc. are almost always -er.

Exceptions. Many other words have -er in British English. These include Germanic words like anger, mother, timber, water and Romance words like danger, quarter, river.

Theater is the prevailing American spelling used to refer to both the dramatic arts and buildings where stage performances and screenings of movies take place (i.e., "movie theaters"); for example, a national newspaper such as The New York Times uses theater throughout its "Theater", "Movies", and "Arts & Leisure" sections. In contrast, the spelling theatre appears in the names of many New York City theaters on Broadway (cf. Broadway theatre) and elsewhere in the United States. In 2003 the proposal of the American National Theatre, eventually to be founded and inaugurated in the fall of 2007, was referred to by the New York Times as the "American National Theater"; but the organization actually uses "re" in the spelling of its name. The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, in Washington, D.C., or The Kennedy Center, features the more common American spelling theater in its references to The Eisenhower Theater, part of The Kennedy Center. Some cinemas outside New York use the "theatre" spelling.

In many instances, places in the United States use Centre in their names. Examples include the Stonebriar Centre mall in Frisco, Texas, the cities of Rockville Centre, New York and Centreville, Illinois, and Centre College in Kentucky. Sometimes these places were named before spelling changes took effect, but more often the spelling merely serves as an affectation. There are also a few cases of the use of Center in the United Kingdom (e.g., the Valley Centertainment in Sheffield, although this is in fact a portmanteau of the cent- of centre and -ertainment of entertainment).

For British accoutre(ment), the American practice varies: the Merriam-Webster Dictionary prefers the -re spelling, but the American Heritage Dictionary the -er spelling.

More recent French loanwords retain an -re spelling in American English. These are not exceptions when a French-style pronunciation is used (/rə/ rather than /ər/), as with double-entendre, genre, or oeuvre. However, the unstressed /ər/ pronunciation of an -er ending is used more or less frequently with some words, including cadre, macabre, maître d', Notre Dame, piastre, and timbre.

Commonwealth usage. The -re endings are mostly standard throughout the Commonwealth. The -er spellings are recognised as minor variants in Canada, due in part to American influences. Proper names, particularly names incorporating the word centre/center, are an occasional source of exceptions, such as, for example, Toronto's controversially-named Centerpoint Mall. However, -re generally prevails in Canada.

-ce, -se

Nouns ending in -ce with -se verb forms: American English and British English both retain the noun/verb distinction in advice / advise and device / devise, but American English has abandoned the distinction with licence / license and practice / practise (where the two words in each pair are homophones) that British spelling retains. American English uses practice and license for both meanings.

American English has kept the Anglo-French spelling for defense and offense, which are usually defence and offence in British English; similarly there are the American pretense and British pretence; but derivatives such as defensive, offensive, and pretension are always thus spelled in both systems.

Australian and Canadian usage generally follows British.

-xion, -ction

The spelling connexion is now rare in everyday British usage and is not used at all in America: the more common connection has become the standard internationally. According to the Oxford English Dictionary the older spelling is more etymologically conservative, since the word actually derives from Latin forms in -xio-. The American usage derives from Webster who discarded the -xion in favour of -ction by analogy with such verbs as connect.

Complexion (which comes from the stem complex) is standard and complection usually is not. However, the adjective complected (as in "dark-complected"), although sometimes objected to, can be used as an alternative to complexioned in the U.S., but is quite unknown in this sense in the UK, although there is an extremely rare usage to mean complicated (OED).

Greek spellings

-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization)

American spelling accepts only -ize endings in most cases, such as organize, realize, and recognize. British usage accepts both -ize and -ise (organize/organise, realize/realise, recognize/recognise). British English using -ize is known as Oxford spelling, and is used in publications of the Oxford University Press, most notably the Oxford English Dictionary, as well as other authoritative British sources. The OED lists the -ise form separately, as "a frequent spelling of -IZE..." It firmly deprecates usage of "-ise" for words of Greek origin, stating, "he suffix..., whatever the element to which it is added, is in its origin the Greek -ιζειν, Latin -izāre; and, as the pronunciation is also with z, there is no reason why in English the special French spelling in -iser should be followed, in opposition to that which is at once etymological and phonetic." It maintains "... some have used the spelling -ise in English, as in French, for all these words, and some prefer -ise in words formed in French or English from Latin elements, retaining -ize for those of Greek composition." Noah Webster rejected -ise for the same reasons.

Other references, including Fowler's Modern English Usage, now give prominence to the -ise suffix over -ize. The Cambridge University Press has long favoured -ise. Perhaps as a reaction to the ascendancy of American spelling, the -ize spelling is now rarely used in the UK mass media and newspapers, to the extent that it is often incorrectly regarded as an Americanism. The ratio between -ise and -ize stands at 3:2 in the British National Corpus. The -ise form is standard in leading publications such as The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Economist. The Oxford spelling (which can be indicated by the registered IANA language tag en-GB-oed), and thus -ize, is used in many British-based academic publications, such as Nature, the Biochemical Journal and The Times Literary Supplement. In Australia and New Zealand -ise spellings strongly prevail; the Australian Macquarie Dictionary, among other sources, gives the -ise spelling first. The -ise form is preferred in Australian English at a ratio of about 3:1 according to the Macquarie Dictionary. Conversely, Canadian usage is essentially like American. Worldwide, -ize endings prevail in scientific writing and are commonly used by many international organisations, such as the ISO and the WHO. The European Union uses ise in its English language publications, though the EU may, even on a single page, show "organized" but "publicise" as well. "Synthesize" is used in international chemical journals.

The same pattern applies to derivatives and inflections such as colonisation/colonization.

Some verbs ending in -ize or -ise do not derive from Greek -ιζειν, and their endings are therefore not interchangeable; some verbs take the -z- form exclusively, for instance capsize, seize (except in the legal phrase to be seised of/to stand seised to), size and prize (only in the "appraise" sense), whereas others take only -s-: advertise, advise, apprise, arise, chastise, circumcise, incise, excise, comprise, compromise, demise, despise, devise, disguise, exercise, franchise, improvise, merchandise, revise, supervise, surmise, surprise, and televise. Finally, the verb prise (meaning to force or lever) is spelled prize in the US and prise everywhere else, including Canada, although in North American English it is commonly replaced by pry, a back-formation from or alteration of prise.

-yse, -yze

The distribution of -yse and -yze endings, as in analyse / analyze, is different: the former is British English, but the latter is American. Thus, in British English analyse, catalyse, hydrolyse, and paralyse, but in American English analyze, catalyze, hydrolyze, and paralyze. However, analyse was commonly spelled analyze from the first—the spelling preferred by Samuel Johnson. This word, which came probably from the French analyser, on Greek analogy would have been analysize, from the French analysiser, from which analyser was formed by haplology. In Canada, -yze prevails, just as in the United States. In Australia and New Zealand, -yse stands alone. Unlike -ise/-ize, neither of the endings has any resemblance to the Greek original ending. The Greek verb from which the word λύσις (lusis) (and thus all its compound words) derives, is λύειν (luein).

-ogue, -og

Some words of Greek origin, a few of which derive from Greek λόγος or αγωγός, can end either in -ogue or in -og: analog(ue), catalog(ue), dialog(ue), demagog(ue), pedagog(ue), monolog(ue), homolog(ue), synagog(ue) etc. In the UK (and generally in the Commonwealth), the -ogue endings are the standard. In the US, catalog has a slight edge over catalogue (the inflected forms, cataloged and cataloging v catalogued and cataloguing); analog is standard for the adjective, but both analogue and analog are current for the noun; in all other cases the -gue endings strongly prevail, for example monologue, except for such expressions as dialog box in computing, which are also used in the UK. Finally, in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia analogue is used, but just as in the US analog has some currency as a technical term (e.g. in electronics, as in "analog electronics" as opposed to "digital electronics" and some video-game consoles might have an analog stick).

The dropping of the "ue" is mandatory in forming such related words as "analogy", "analogous", and "analogist".

Simplification of ae and oe

Many words are written with ae/æ or oe/œ in British English, but a single e in American English. The sound in question is /iː/ or /ɛ/ (or unstressed /ɨ/). Examples (with non-American letter in bold): amoeba, anaemia, anaesthesia, caesium, diarrhoea, foetal, gynaecology, haemophilia, leukaemia, oesophagus, oestrogen, orthopaedic, palaeontology, paediatric. Oenology is acceptable in American English but is regarded as a minor variant of enology.

Exceptions to the American simplification rule include aesthetics and archaeology, which usually prevail over esthetics and archeology, respectively, as well as the stronger case of palaestra, in which the simplified form palestra is a variant described by Merriam-Webster as "chiefly Brit."

Words where British usage varies include encyclopaedia, homoeopathy, mediaeval, and foetus (though the British medical community, as well as at least one authoritative source, consider this variant to be unacceptable for the purposes of journal articles and the like, since the Latin spelling was actually fetus).

The Ancient Greek diphthongs <αι> and <οι> were transliterated into Latin as <ae> and <oe>. The ligatures æ and œ were introduced when the sounds became monophthongs, and later applied to words not of Greek origin, in both Latin (for example, cœli) and French (for example, œuvre). In English, which has imported words from all three languages, it is now usual to replace Æ/æ with Ae/ae and Œ/œ with Oe/oe. In many cases, the digraph has been reduced to a single e in all varieties of English: for example, oeconomics, praemium, and aenigma. In others, it is retained in all varieties: for example, phoenix, and usually subpoena. This is especially true of names: Caesar, Oedipus, Phoebe, etc. There is no reduction of Latin -ae plurals (e.g. larvae); nor where the digraph <ae>/<oe> does not result from the Greek-style ligature: for example, maelstrom, toe. The British form aeroplane is an instance (compare other aero- words such as aerosol). The now chiefly North American airplane is not a respelling but a recoining, modeled after airship and aircraft. The word airplane dates from 1907, at which time the prefix aero- was trisyllabic, often written aëro-.

Commonwealth usage

In Canada, e is usually preferred over oe and often over ae as well, just as in the neighboring United States. In Australia and elsewhere, the British usage prevails, but the spellings with just e are increasingly used. Manoeuvre is the only spelling in Australia, and the most common one in Canada, where maneuver and manoeuver are also sometimes found.

This shortening is natural, especially since the Canadian Forces in the air and on the oceans are frequently involved in joint maneuvers with the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Navy. In Canada, oe and ae are used occasionally in the academic and science communities.

Internationally, the American spelling is closer to the usage in a number of other languages using the Latin alphabet;. For instance, almost all Romance languages (which tend to have more phonemic spelling) lack the ae and oe spellings (a notable exception being in French), as do Swedish, Polish, and others, while Dutch uses them sometimes ("ae" is rare, but "oe" is the normal representation of the sound IPA: [u], while written "u" represents either the sound y or ʏ in IPA). The languages Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian and some others retain the original ligatures. In German, through umlauts, is retained as its equivalent of the ligature, for when written without the umlaut. These words resemble the British usage (i.e. ä becomes ae and ö becomes oe). Similarly, Hungarian uses "é" as a replacement for "ae" (although it becomes "e" sometimes), and the special character "ő" (sometimes "ö") for "oe".

Compounds and hyphens

British English often prefers hyphenated compounds, such as counter-attack, whereas American English discourages the use of hyphens in compounds where there is no compelling reason, so counterattack is much more common. Many dictionaries do not point out such differences. Canadian and Australian usage is mixed, although Commonwealth writers generally hyphenate compounds of the form noun plus phrase (such as editor-in-chief). Commander-in-chief is dominant in all forms of English.

• any more or anymore: In sense "any longer", the single-word form is usual in North America and Australia but unusual elsewhere, at least in formal writing. Other senses always have the two-word form; thus Americans distinguish "I couldn't love you anymore " from "I couldn't love you any more ". In Hong Kong English, any more is always two words.
• for ever or forever: Traditional British English usage makes a distinction between for ever, meaning for eternity (or a very long time into the future), as in "If you are waiting for income tax to be abolished you will probably have to wait for ever"; and forever, meaning continually, always, as in "They are forever arguing". In contemporary British usage, however, forever prevails in the "for eternity" sense as well, in spite of several style guides maintaining the distinction. American writers usually use forever regardless of which sense they intend (although forever in the sense of "continually" is comparatively rare in American English, having been displaced by always).
• near by or nearby: Some British writers make the distinction between the adverbial near by, which is written as two words, as in, "No one was near by"; and the adjectival nearby, which is written as one, as in, "The nearby house". In American English, the one-word spelling is standard for both forms.

Doubled consonants

Doubled in British English

The final consonant of an English word is sometimes doubled in both American and British spelling when adding a suffix beginning with a vowel, for example strip/stripped, which prevents confusion with stripe/striped and shows the difference in pronunciation (see digraph). Generally, this occurs only when the word's final syllable is stressed and when it also ends with a single vowel followed by a single consonant. In British English, however, a final -l is often doubled even when the final syllable is unstressed. This exception is no longer usual in American English, apparently because of Noah Webster. The -ll- spellings are nevertheless still regarded as acceptable variants by both Merriam-Webster Collegiate and American Heritage dictionaries.

• The British English doubling is required for all inflections (-ed, -ing, -er, -est) and for the noun suffixes -er and -or. Therefore, British English usage is counsellor, cruellest, modelling, quarrelled, signalling, traveller, and travelling. Americans usually use counselor, cruelest, modeling, quarreled, signaling, traveler, and traveling.
  • The word parallel keeps a single -l- in British English, as in American English (paralleling, unparalleled), to avoid the unappealing cluster -llell-.
  • Words with two vowels before a final l are also spelled with -ll- in British English before a suffix when the first vowel either acts as a consonant (equalling and initialled; in the United States, equaling or initialed), or belongs to a separate syllable (British fu•el•ling and di•alled; American fu•el•ing and di•aled).
    • British woollen is a further exception due to the double vowel (American: woolen). Also, wooly is accepted in American English, though woolly dominates in both systems.
• Endings -ize/-ise, -ism, -ist, -ish usually do not double the l in British English; for example, normalise, dualism, novelist, and devilish.
  • Exceptions: tranquillise; duellist, medallist, panellist, and sometimes triallist in British English.
• For -ous, British English has a single l in scandalous and perilous, but the "ll" in marvellous and libellous.
• For -ee, British English has libellee.
• For -age, British English has pupillage but vassalage.
• American English sometimes has an unstressed -ll-, as in the U.K., in some words where the root has -l. These are cases where the alteration occurs in the source language, which was often Latin. (Examples: bimetallism, cancellation, chancellor, crystallize, excellent, tonsillitis, and raillery.)
• All forms of English have compelled, excelling, propelled, rebelling (notice the stress difference); revealing, fooling (note the double vowel before the l); and hurling (consonant before the l).
• Canadian and Australian English largely follow British usage.

Among consonants other than l, practice varies for some words, such as where the final syllable has secondary stress or an unreduced vowel. In the United States, the spellings kidnaped and worshiped, which were introduced by the Chicago Tribune in the 1920s, are common. Kidnapped and worshipped, the only standard British spellings.

Miscellaneous:

• British calliper or caliper; American caliper.
• British jewellery; American jewelry. The standard pronunciations (/ˈdʒuː(ə)lri/) do not reflect this difference. According to Fowler, jewelry used to be the "rhetorical and poetic" spelling in the U.K. Canada has both, but jewellery is more often used. Likewise, the Commonwealth (including Canada) has jeweller and the United States has jeweler for a jewel(le)ry retailer.

Doubled in American English

Conversely, there are words where British writers prefer a single l and Americans usually use a double l. In American usage, the spelling of words is usually not changed when they form the main part (not prefix or suffix) of other words, especially in newly formed words and in words whose main part is in common use. Words exhibiting this spelling difference include wil(l)ful, skil(l)ful, thral(l)dom, appal(l), fulfil(l), fulfil(l)ment, enrol(l)ment, instal(l)ment. These words have monosyllabic cognates always written with -ll: will, skill, thrall, pall, fill, roll, stall, still. Cases where a single l nevertheless occurs in both American and British English include null→annul, annulment; till→until; and others where the connection is not transparent or the monosyllabic cognate is not in common use in American English (e.g. null is used mainly as a technical term in law, mathematics, and computer science).

In the U.K., ll is used occasionally in distil(l), instil(l), enrol(l), and enthral(l)ment, and often in enthral(l), all of which are always spelled this way in American usage. The former British spellings instal, fulness, and dulness are now quite rare. The Scottish tolbooth is cognate with toll booth, but it has a specific distinct sense.

In both American and British usages, words normally spelled -ll usually drop the second l when used as prefixes or suffixes, for example full→useful, handful; all→almighty, altogether; well→welfare, welcome; chill→chilblain.

The British fulfil and American fulfill are never fullfill or fullfil.

Dr Johnson wavered on this issue. His dictionary of 1755 lemmatises distil and instill, downhil and uphill.

Dropped e

British English sometimes keeps silent e when adding suffixes where American English does not. Generally speaking, British English drops it in only some cases in which it is unnecessary to indicate pronunciation whereas American English only uses it where necessary.

• British prefers ageing, American usually aging (compare raging, ageism). For the noun or verb "route", British English often uses routeing;, but in America routing is used. (The military term rout forms routing everywhere.) However, all of these word form "router", whether used in the context of carpentry, data communications, or military. (e.g. "Attacus was the router of the Huns at ....")

Both forms of English retain the silent e in the words dyeing, singeing, and swingeing (in the sense of dye, singe, and swinge), to distinguish from dying, singing, swinging (in the sense of die, sing, and swing). In contrast, both bathe and the British verb bath both form bathing. Both forms of English vary for tinge and twinge; both prefer cringing, hinging, lunging, syringing.

• Before -able, British English prefers likeable, liveable, rateable, saleable, sizeable, unshakeable, where American practice prefers to drop the -e; but both British and American English prefer breathable, curable, datable, lovable, movable, notable, provable, quotable, scalable, solvable, usable, and those where the root is polysyllabic, like believable or decidable. Both forms of the language retain the silent e when it is necessary to preserve a soft c, ch, or g, such as in traceable, cacheable, changeable; both usually retain the "e" after -dge, as in knowledgeable, unbridgeable, and unabridgeable. ("These rights are unabridgeable.")
• Both abridgment and the more regular abridgement are current in America, only the latter in the UK. Similarly for the word lodg(e)ment. Both judgment and judgement are in use interchangeably everywhere, although the former prevails in America and the latter prevails in the UK except in the practice of law, where judgment is standard. The similar situation holds for abridgment. Both forms of English fledgling to fledgeling, but ridgeling to ridgling.
• The word "blue" always drops the "e" when forming "bluish".

Different spellings, different connotations

• artefact or artifact: In British usage, artefact is the main spelling and artifact a minor variant. In American English, artifact is the usual spelling. Canadians prefer artifact and Australians artefact, according to their respective dictionaries. Artefact reflects Arte-fact(um), the Latin source.
• dependant or dependent: British dictionaries distinguish between dependent (adjective) and dependant (noun). In the US, dependent is usual for both noun and adjective, notwithstanding that dependant is also an acceptable variant for the noun form in the US.
• disc or disk: Traditionally, disc used to be British and disk American. Both spellings are etymologically sound (Greek diskos, Latin discus), although disk is earlier. In computing, disc is used for optical discs (e.g. a CD, Compact Disc; DVD, Digital Versatile/Video Disc) while disk is used for products using magnetic storage (e.g. hard disks or floppy disks, also known as diskettes). For this limited application, these spellings are used in both the US and the Commonwealth.
• enquiry or inquiry: According to Fowler, inquiry should be used in relation to a formal inquest, and enquiry to the act of questioning. Many (though not all) British writers maintain this distinction; the OED, on the other hand, lists inquiry and enquiry as equal alternatives, in that order. Some British dictionaries, such as Chambers 21st Century Dictionary, present the two spellings as interchangeable variants in the general sense, but prefer inquiry for the "formal inquest" sense. In the US, only inquiry is commonly used. In Australia, inquiry and enquiry are often interchangeable, but inquiry prevails in writing. Both are current in Canada, where enquiry is often associated with scholarly or intellectual research.
• ensure or insure: In the UK (and Australia), the word ensure (to make sure, to make certain) has a distinct meaning from the word insure (often followed by against – to guarantee or protect against, typically by means of an "insurance policy"). The distinction is only about a century old, and this helps explain why in (North) America ensure is just a variant of insure, more often than not. According to Merriam-Webster's usage notes, ensure and insure "are interchangeable in many contexts where they indicate the making certain or inevitable of an outcome, but ensure may imply a virtual guarantee <the government has ensured the safety of the refugees>, while insure sometimes stresses the taking of necessary measures beforehand <careful planning should insure the success of the party>.
• insurance or assurance: In the business of risk transfer, American English speakers will normally refer to life insurance or fire insurance, whereas historically British English speakers would more commonly refer to life assurance, reserving insurance for the home. This distinction no longer applies, with British companies as likely as US ones to provide "life insurance". Canadian speakers remain more likely than US speakers to use assurance.
• matt or matte: In the UK, matt refers to a non-glossy surface, and matte to the motion-picture technique; in the US, matte covers both.
• programme or program: The British programme is a 19th-century French version of program. Program first appeared in Scotland in the 17th century and is the only spelling found in the US. The OED entry, written around 1908 and listing both spellings, said program was preferable, since it conformed to the usual representation of the Greek as in anagram, diagram, telegram etc. In British English, program is the common spelling for computer programs, but for other meanings programme is used. In Australia, program has been endorsed by government writing standards for all senses since the 1960s, although programme is also seen; see also the name of The Micallef Program(me). In Canada, program prevails, and the Canadian Oxford Dictionary makes no meaning-based distinction between it and programme. However, some Canadian government documents nevertheless use programme in all senses of the word – and also to match the spelling of the French equivalent.
• tonne or ton: in the UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, the spelling tonne refers to the metric unit (1000 kilograms), whereas in the US the same unit is referred to as a metric ton. The unqualified ton usually refers to the long ton (2,240 lb.) in the UK (but note that the tonne and long ton differ by only 1.6%, and are roughly interchangeable when accuracy is not critical; ton and tonne are usually pronounced the same in speech), and to the short ton (2,000 pounds (910 kg)) in the US.
• whilst or while: British usage generally prefers whilst to indicate "during the time that something else is happening", and while to mean "although". In the United States, whilst is never used; while is used for each of these meanings.

See also meter/metre, for which there is a British English distinction between these etymologically related forms with different meanings but the standardised American spelling is "meter". The spelling used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures is "metre". This spelling is also the usual one in most English-speaking countries, but only the spelling "meter" is used in American English, and this is officially endorsed by the United States.

A few British publications prefer to use kilogramme for the metric unit of mass and gramme, but kilogram and gram are the more common spellings in British English and therefore listed first in British dictionaries. In the United States, the spellings are always (kilo)gram, and these are also used exclusively by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures.

Telegramme is used in some places, but never in the United States, where it was always telegram.

Acronyms and abbreviations

Proper names formed as proper acronyms are often rendered in title case by Commonwealth writers, but usually as upper case by Americans: for example, Nasa / NASA or Unicef / UNICEF. This does not apply to most pure initialisms, such as US, NATO, IBM, or PRC (the People's Republic of China). However, it is occasionally done for some in the UK, such as Pc (Police Constable).

Contractions, where the final letter is present, are often written in British English without full stops/periods (Mr, Mrs, Dr, St, Ave). Abbreviations where the final letter is not present generally do take full stops/periods (such as vol., etc., i.e., ed.); British English shares this convention with the French: Mlle, Mme, Dr, Ste, but M. for Monsieur. In American and Canadian English, abbreviations like St., Ave., Mr., Mrs., Ms., Dr., and Jr., always require periods. Some initials are usually upper case in America but lower case in Britain: liter/litre and its compounds ("2 L or 25 mL" vs "2 l or 25 ml"); and ante meridiem and post meridiem (10 P.M. or 10 PM vs 10 p.m. or 10 pm).

Miscellaneous spelling differences

In a few cases (e.g. "orient", "acclimate"), one form has an extra syllable compared to the other, so they might be regarded as different words, and more accurately be described as "usage differences" rather than "spelling differences".

Punctuation

For quotation marks, American English generally uses "double quotes" primarily except in newspaper headings, while the British more commonly use 'single quotes' primarily outside of periodicals. British English always puts sentence-final punctuation outside of quotation marks if it is not part of the quoted material; e.g. 'word'. instead of "word.", which is a more typically American typesetting convention.

See also

• English in the Commonwealth of Nations
• Australian English
• Canadian English
• Hiberno-English
• New Zealand English
• South African English
• English orthography (spelling)
• The Chicago Manual of Style

Tools

• User:Ohconfucius/EngvarB - Script to convert the entire contents of a page from American spelling to British spelling

Notes

1. Scragg, Donald (1974). A history of English spelling. Manchester, England: Manchester University Press. pp. 82–83. ISBN 9780064961387. Johnson's dictionary became the accepted standard for private spelling...of a literate Englishman...during the nineteenth century...Webster had more success in influencing the development of American usage than Johnson had with British usage.
2. Clark, 2009.
3. Chambers, 1998.
4. Oxford English Dictionary, airplane, draft revision March 2008; airplane is labeled "chiefly North American"
5. British National Corpus. Retrieved 1 April 2008.
6. Merriam-Webster online, aerodrome. Retrieved 1 April 2008.
7. Oxford English Dictionary, airdrome.
8. History & Etymology of Aluminium
9. Peters, p. 32.
10. Murray, James A. H. (1880). Spelling Reform. Annual address of the President of the Philological Society. Bath: Isaac Pitman. p. 5. Retrieved 3 May 2010.
11. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition.
12. OED, shivaree
13. Oxford English Dictionary, furore.
14. Peters, p. 221.
15. Oxford English Dictionary, Grotty; Grody
16. Peters, p. 242
17. Oxford English Dictionary, mom and mam
18. Added by Symphony on 15 Oct. 2009 (15 October 2009). "Things I don't Understand: Part 3 – Canada!". giantbomb. Retrieved 7 February 2010.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
19. Peters, p. 364.
20. Merriam Webster's 11th Collegiate Dictionary, naïveté and naivety.
21. OED, s.v. 'pyjamas'
22. Oxford English Dictionary, persnickety
23. Peters, p. 487
24. In Webster's New World College Dictionary, scalawag is lemmatized without alternative, while scallawag and scallywag are defined by cross-reference to it. All of them are marked as "originally American".
25. See, for example, the November 2006 BMA document titled Selection for Specialty Training
26. Peters, p. 510.
27. ^ Webster's Third, p. 24a.
28. Oxford English Dictionary, colour, color.
29. ^ Onions, CT, ed. (1987) . The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (Third Edition (1933) with corrections (1975) ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 370. ISBN 0 19 861126 9. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help)
30. ^ Peters, p. 397.
31. Johnson 1755—preface
32. Mencken, H L (1919). The American Language. New York: Knopf. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
33. Staff. "The Proceedings of the Old Bailey, 1674–1913". Humanities Research Institute, University of Sheffield. Retrieved 19 June 2008. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
34. Oxford English Dictionary, honour, honor.
35. Baldrige, Letitia (1990). Letitia Baldrige's Complete Guide to the New Manners for the '90s: A Complete Guide to Etiquette. Rawson. p. 214. ISBN 0-892-56320-6.
36. Venezky, Richard L. (2001). "-re versus -er". In Algeo, John (ed.). The Cambridge History of the English Language. Vol. VI: English in North America. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. p. 353. ISBN 0-521-26479-0.
37. Howard, Philip (1984). The State of the Language—English Observed. London: Hamish Hamilton. p. 148. ISBN 0241113466. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
38. ^ Although acre was spelled æcer in Old English and aker in Middle English, the acre spelling of Middle French was introduced in the 15th Century. Similarly, loover was respelled in the 17th Century by influence of the unrelated Louvre. (see OED, s.v. acre and louvre)
39. From the OED cites, Chaucer used both forms, but the last usages of the "re" form were in the early 1700s. The Oxford English Dictionary: 1989 edition.
40. (except in a 1579 usage) The Oxford English Dictionary: 1989 edition.
41. Gove, Philip, ed. (1989). "-er/-re". Webster's third new international dictionary of the English language. Vol. 2 (3 ed.). Springfield, MA: Merriam Webster. pp. 24a. ISBN 9780877793021.
42. Robin Pogrebin (3 September 2003). "Proposing an American Theater Downtown". The New York Times. The New York Times Company. Retrieved 22 September 2008. {{cite news}}: |section= ignored (help)
43. "The American National Theatre (ANT)". ANT. 2008–2009. Retrieved 22 September 2008.
44. "The Kennedy Center". John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Retrieved 22 September 2008.
45. "Cinemark Theatres". Centurytheaters.com. Retrieved 7 February 2010.
46. accoutre
47. accouter
48. Peters, p. 461.
49. Style Manual for Authors, Editors and Printers of Australian Government Publications, Third Edition, Revised by John Pitson, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1978, page 10, "In general, follow the spellings given in the latest edition of the Concise Oxford Dictionary.
50. 1989 Oxford English Dictionary:connexion, connection.
51. "The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language:complection" (Document). New York: Houghton Mifflin. 2000. {{cite document}}: Unknown parameter |accessdate= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |url= ignored (help)
52. "The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language:complected" (Document). New York: Houghton Mifflin. 2000. {{cite document}}: Unknown parameter |accessdate= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |url= ignored (help)
53. ^ "Are spellings like 'privatize' and 'organize' Americanisms?". AskOxford.com. 2006.
54. Oxford English Dictionary "-ise"
55. Oxford English Dictionary, -ize.
56. Hargraves, p. 22.
57. ^ Allen, Robert, ed. (2009). Pocket Fowler's Modern English Usage. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. p. 354. may be legitimately spelt with either -ize or -ise throughout the English-speaking world (except in America, where -ize is always used)...Cambridge University Press and others prefer -ise
58. Peters, p. 298
59. Peters, p. 298.
60. "prize". Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002. Also, "prize". Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Ed.
61. According to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Ed.: prise is a "chiefly Brit var of PRIZE".
62. Peters, p. 441
63. Peters, p. 446.
64. Oxford English Dictionary, analyse, -ze, v. . Retrieved
65. Both the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and American Heritage Dictionary have catalog as the main headword and catalogue as an equal variant.
66. Peters, p. 236.
67. MSDN C#.NET OpenFileDialog Class
68. Peters, p. 36.
69. Peters, p. 20.
70. Webster's Third New International Dictionary, copyright 1993 by Merriam-Webster, Inc.
71. The Economist Style Guide, copyright 2005 by The Economist Newspaper Ltd
72. Webster's Third, p. 23a.
73. Wilson, Kenneth G. (1993). "subpoena, subpena (n., v.)". The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 0231069898. Retrieved 8 November 2007. {{cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)
74. Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, airplane.
75. Peters, p. 20, p. 389.
76. Peters, p. 338.
77. Peters, p. 258
78. Peters, p. 41.
79. Bunton, David. Common Englsh Errors in Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Longman. p. 6. ISBN 0582999146.
80. Oxford English Dictionary, for ever.
81. AskOxford: forever. Retrieved 24 June 2008. Cf. Peters, p. 214.
82. For example, The Times, The Guardian, The Economist. Retrieved 24 June 2008.
83. The Columbia Guide to Standard American English
84. ^ Peters, p. 309.
85. Cf. Oxford English Dictionary, traveller, traveler.
86. Peters, p. 581
87. Zorn, Eric (8 June 1997). "Errant Spelling: Moves for simplification turn Inglish into another langwaj". Chicago Tribune. pp. Section 3A page 14. Retrieved 17 March 2007.
88. Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary, jewellery U.K., American jewelry
89. Peters, p. 283
90. Peters, p. 501.
91. Peters, p. 22.
92. Peters, p. 480. Also National Routeing Guide
93. In American English, swingeing is sometimes spelled swinging see American Heritage Dictionary entry, and the reader has to discern from the context which word and pronunciation is meant.
94. ^ British National Corpus
95. Peters, p. 7
96. Peters, p. 303.
97. Oxford English Dictionary, artefact.
98. Peters, p. 49.
99. Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. March 2009.
100. Merriam-Webster Online. . Retrieved 30 December 2007.
101. Howarth, Lynne C (14 June 1999). ""Executive summary" from review of "International Standard Bibliographic Description for Electronic Resources"". American Library Association. Retrieved 30 April 2007. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
102. Peters, p. 282.
103. "Chambers | Free English Dictionary". Chambersharrap.co.uk. Retrieved 7 February 2010.
104. Peters, p. 285
105. Merriam-Webster Online. . Retrieved 30 December 2007.
106. Peters, 51 "assurance or insurance"
107. Peters, p. 340.
108. ^ Peters, p. 443.
109. Bureau International des Poids et Mesures, 2006, p. 124.
110. The Metric Conversion Act of 1985 gives the Secretary of Commerce of the US the responsibility of interpreting or modifying the SI for use in the US. The Secretary of Commerce delegated this authority to the Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) (Turner, 2008). In 2008, the NIST published the US version (Taylor and Thompson, 2008a) of the English text of the eighth edition of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures publication Le Système International d’ Unités (SI) (BIPM, 2006). In the NIST publication, the spellings "meter", "liter", and "deka" are used rather than "metre", "litre", and "deca" as in the original BIPM English text (Taylor and Thompson, 2008a, p. iii). The Director of the NIST officially recognised this publication, together with Taylor and Thompson (2008b), as the "legal interpretation" of the SI for the United States (Turner, 2008).
111. Marsh, David (14 July 2004). The Guardian Stylebook. Atlantic Books. ISBN 1843549913. Retrieved 9 April 2007. acronyms: take initial cap: Aids, Isa, Mori, Nato
112. See for example "Pc bitten on face in Tube attack". BBC. 31 March 2007. Retrieved 9 April 2007.
113. "Units outside the SI". Essentials of the SI. NIST. Retrieved 22 October 2009. although both l and L are internationally accepted symbols for the liter, to avoid this risk the preferred symbol for use in the United States is L
114. "Core learning in mathematics: Year 4" (PDF). Review of the 1999 Framework. DCSF. 2006. p. 4. Retrieved 22 October 2009. Use, read and write standard metric units (km, m, cm, mm, kg, g, l, ml), including their abbreviations
115. "PM". Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. Merriam-Webster. 2009. Retrieved 21 October 2009.
116. "P.M.". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.). Houghton Mifflin. 2000. {{cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)
117. "What is the correct or more usual written form when writing the time – a.m., am, or A.M.?". AskOxford. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 21 October 2009.
118. ^ Peters, p. 104.
119. Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary. Retrieved 2009-4-19.
120. Merriam-Webster Online. . Retrieved 1 January 2008.
121. Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. . Retrieved 1 January 2008.
122. "draught". Concise OED. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)
123. Peters, p. 165.
124. Oxford English Dictionary, draught.
125. Garner, Bryan A. (1998). A Dictionary of Modern American Usage. New York: OUP. p. 313. ISBN 0195078535.
126. "gauntlet". Concise OED. {{cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)
127. Peters, p. 235
128. tiscali.reference. Retrieved on 10 March 2007.
129. Ernout, Alfred (2001). Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine. Paris: Klincksieck. p. 362. ISBN 2252033592. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
130. Peters, p. 321.
131. Peters, p. 360
132. Peters, p. 392.
133. Oxford English Dictionary, phoney, phony
134. Peters, p. 449.
135. Oxford English Dictionary, plough, plow.
136. Peters, p. 230.
137. Maven's word of the day: rack/wrack
138. Cald Rack
139. Peters, p. 502.
140. Oxford English Dictionary, sceptic, skeptic.
141. Peters, Pam (2002). "storey or story". The Cambridge Guide to English Usage. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. p. 517. ISBN 0-521-62181-x. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
142. Royal Society of Chemistry 1992 policy change
143. "The spelling sulfur predominates in United States technical usage, while both sulfur and sulphur are common in general usage. British usage tends to favor sulphur for all applications. The same pattern is seen in most of the words derived from sulfur." Usage note, Merriam-Webster Online. . Retrieved 1 January 2008.
144. The contrasting spellings of the chemical elements Al and S mean that the American spelling aluminum sulfide becomes aluminum sulphide in Canada, and as aluminium sulphide in older British usage.
145. Peters, p. 553.
146. Peters, p. 566.
147. Peters, p. 587. Yogourt is an accepted variant in French of the more normal Standard French yaourt.
148. Merriam-Webster Online – Yogurt entry

References

• Burchfield, R. W. (Editor); Fowler, H. W. (1996). The New Fowler's Modern English Usage. Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-869126-2
• Chambers, J.K. (1998). “Canadian English: 250 Years in the Making,” in The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, 2nd ed., p xi.
• Clark, Joe (2009). Organizing Our Marvellous Neighbours: How to Feel Good About Canadian English (e-book, version 1.1). ISBN 978-0-9809525-0-6.
• Fowler, Henry; Winchester, Simon (introduction) (2003 reprint). A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (Oxford Language Classics Series). Oxford Press. ISBN 0-19-860506-4.
• Hargraves, Orin (2003). Mighty Fine Words and Smashing Expressions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-515704-4
• Mencken, H. L. (1921). "Chapter 8. American Spelling > 1. The Two Orthographies". The American language: An inquiry into the development of English in the United States, (2nd ed., rev. and enl. ed.). New York: A.A. Knopf. ISBN 1-58734-087-9.
• Nicholson, Margaret; (1957). "A Dictionary of American-English Usage Based on Fowler's Modern English Usage". Signet, by arrangement with Oxford University Press.
• Oxford English Dictionary, 20 vols. (1989) Oxford University Press.
• Peters, Pam (2004). The Cambridge Guide to English Usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-62181-X.
• Webster's Third New International Dictionary (1961; repr. 2002) Merriam-Webster, Inc.

External links

• Hart's Rules
• The Chicago Manual of Style
• The Guardian style guide
• Word substitution list, by the Ubuntu English (United Kingdom) Translators team

• American and British English differences
• English spelling