Quiet or quite: which is correct?
Correct
quiet (silent, calm) / quite (fairly; completely)
Avoid
quite (for "silent")
Avoid
quiet (for "fairly")
Summary
Correct: quiet (silent, calm) / quite (fairly; completely) — Avoid: quite (for "silent") / quiet (for "fairly"). Quiet = making little or no noise, calm (adjective); quite = to a certain degree, fairly, or completely (adverb).
- Part of speech
- adjective / adverb
- Source
- Oxford
Why
Oxford: quiet (two syllables, qui-et) is the adjective meaning making little noise; quite (one syllable) is an adverb of degree. Swapping the last two letters turns one into the other, which is why spell checkers rarely catch it.
Examples
- The library is quiet in the morning.
- The results were quite surprising.
Check your own text: Spell Checker
Catch typos and common misspellings in American or British English, with suggestions, checked right in your browser.
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)