Spelling.School · How to spell

How to spell surf

hear itsurf/sɜrf/nounLong vowels

What it means: Waves breaking on the shore.

In a sentence: We watched the dolphins jump over the surf.

The part people get wrong

Often misspelled as serf or serff.

Same family: surfer, surfing, seashore, wave, shoreline. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: “Surf” likely comes from an earlier word meaning a sudden rush of water, and is related to the word “sough,” meaning a rushing or murmuring sound. It has been used in English since the 17th century to describe waves breaking on the shore.

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