How to spell certain

hear itcer·tain/'sɜrtən/adjectiveLong vowels

What it means: Having no doubt; confident and assured.

In a sentence: She is certain that her cat loves to play with strings.

The part people get wrong

Watch for an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as cirtain or certean.

Same family: certainty, certainly, uncertain, uncertainty, certify. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: Certain comes from the Latin word 'certus,' meaning 'sure' or 'fixed.' It entered English through Old French, which is why its spelling looks less phonetic than it sounds.

Patterns it uses: The unstressed vowel (schwa)

Try spelling it

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Words like this

never · answer · interest · service · determine · nervous · phenomenon · knowledge

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