How to spell excellent

hear itex·cel·lent/'ɛksələnt/adjectiveSilent and tricky

What it means: Of very high quality.

In a sentence: The cake tastes excellent!

The part people get wrong

Watch for double l, and an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as exelent or excelent.

Same family: excellence, excellently, excelling, excellentness, superb. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: “Excellent” comes from the Latin verb “excellere,” meaning “to rise up” or “to surpass,” so something excellent literally ‘stands out’ above the rest. It entered English through Old French in the Middle Ages and has been a high-praise word for centuries.

Patterns it uses: Double the consonant before a suffix? · The unstressed vowel (schwa)

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.

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