How to spell interest

hear itin·ter·est/'ɪntərɪst/nounLong vowels

What it means: An activity or hobby that a person enjoys.

In a sentence: Reading books is my favorite interest.

The part people get wrong

Watch for an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as intrest or interst.

Same family: interested, interesting, disinterest, uninterested, interestingly. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: “Interest” comes from Latin ‘interesse,’ meaning ‘to be between’ or ‘to be important,’ and later developed the sense of something that matters to you or catches your attention. Over time, English speakers began using it as both a noun and a verb, as in “to interest someone.”

Patterns it uses: 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.

Words like this

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

Spelling.School is a spaced-repetition spelling practice: ten minutes a day, every word spoken aloud, every miss explained, and every word coming back just before you would forget it. Try five words without signing up.