Independent or independant: which is correct?
Standard form: independent — Non-standard: independant / indepedent. Independent = free from outside control; not depending on another person or thing.
- Part of speech
- adjective / noun
- Source
- Oxford / Merriam-Webster
Why
Oxford: independent comes from Latin dependere and takes the -ent ending, like dependent and independence. The -ant spelling exists only in the British noun dependant (a person who depends on someone), which Merriam-Webster treats as a variant of dependent.
Examples
- She has been financially independent since university.
- An independent audit confirmed the figures.
Wrong → right
Native spelling engine
- Checked against
- Merriam-Webster / Oxford
- Spelling authority
- Merriam-Webster · Oxford English Dictionary / Oxford spelling · SCOWL
- Commonly confused and non-standard forms
- 64
- Dictionary
- Hunspell en_US / en_GB / en_AU / en_CA · Dictionary license: MIT AND BSD (SCOWL combined licence)
Commonly confused words
Commonly confused words are pairs or groups that sound or look alike but differ in meaning or grammar, such as affect and effect, its and it’s, or principal and principle. Each entry here explains the difference in plain words, shows it in two example sentences and names the convention it follows: Merriam-Webster for American English, Oxford for British English. Spelling variants such as colour and color are marked as correct in their own variety, not as errors.
Related entries
- Standard form: definitelyNon-standard: definately, definitly, definetly
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- Standard form: accommodateNon-standard: accomodate, acommodate, acomodate
- Desert or dessert
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