How to spell ceiling

hear itceil·ing/'silɪŋ/nounSounds

What it means: The upper surface of a room.

In a sentence: The colorful balloons touched the ceiling.

The part people get wrong

Watch for the order of ei. Often misspelled as cieling or ceeling.

Same family: price ceiling, wage ceiling, salary cap, upper limit, maximum. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: In the 1500s, “ceiling” first referred to the inside surface of a room’s roof, from the Middle English word for covering. Much later, English speakers borrowed that idea to describe a figurative ‘upper limit’ in finance and law, such as a price ceiling or a wage ceiling.

Patterns it uses: i before e?

Try spelling it

You will hear the word and a sentence. Type it and press Enter. Then four more words from the same level, so you know where you stand.

Words like this

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