The word weird can be tricky to spell. Is it ‘weird’ or ‘wierd’? Please read this article to find out the correct spelling and meaning of the word, plus how and when to use it.
So how do you spell 'weird'?
The correct answer is that you should spell it ‘weird’ with the 'e' coming before the 'i.' ‘Wierd’ is not the correct way to spell the word and is always seen as an error when spelled that way.
Let's break down the word a bit more and look into how spellings and some related rules of the English language work. If you're only looking for how to spell the word, you have your answer. If you want to keep learning about the background and possible mistakes using the word, then you can keep reading.
The English language has many rules… and many exceptions.
Case in point, with our articles Nosy vs. Nosey, Dying vs. Dieing, or Time Flies vs. Time Flys.
The rules are put in place to help learners grasp the correct use of the language, from grammar to spelling and proper verb usage.
Teachers and educators over the years have put their heads together to come up with catchy ways to help their students remember the rules.
And that’s all well and good, but unfortunately, English is one of the languages with the most exceptions to the rules, making it particularly difficult for users to get it right.
To illustrate, let us tell you about the rule for words with the letters ‘i’ and ‘e.’
There’s a mnemonic that goes something like this: “I before e, except after c.” This catchy, rhyming sentence has good intentions, but the problem is that it doesn’t even apply to most words. Indeed, there are so many exceptions that it can’t exactly function as a rule.
In fact, we should probably disregard it entirely.
So, if you’d never heard this mnemonic before, we encourage you to forget it quickly. But knowing this does help to understand why there is such confusion around the spelling of the word ‘weird.’ It’s because, according to the popular rhyme that is often taught in schools, the word should be spelled ‘wierd.’
Several other words could be confused with the word ‘weird’ due to their similar spelling and almost identical series of letters. Here are some of those words:
So what does the word ‘weird’ actually mean? Let’s explore its definition and the different forms the word can take.
The most common use of the word ‘weird’ is to describe something as odd.
The Merriam-Webster dictionary also explains a second meaning: of, relating to, or caused by witchcraft or the supernatural. But the word is rarely used in that sense anymore. It is a leftover definition from the original meaning of the word.
Indeed, the word ‘weird’ comes from the Old English word ‘wyrd,’ which means ‘fate.’ But the word evolved to refer to witchery, a meaning that Shakespeare’s Weird Sisters notably popularized.
Either way, the word is an adjective, which means it’s used to qualify a noun.
Here are a few examples of the word 'weird' in a sentence:
Note how the word ‘weird’ in these sentences always describes the noun in the sentence.
We won't be giving any examples of the word 'wierd' in a sentence because, as you now know, this is not a word.
The word ‘weird’ can also take on other grammatical forms. One of those is that of an adverb: ‘weirdly.’
As a reminder, an adverb modifies an adjective, a verb, a clause, another adverb, or other types of words or phrases. This means you can use ‘weirdly’ in a sentence to express that the thing being done had an odd quality to it. See the following examples:
In the third sentence, the adverb ‘weirdly’ also adds a sense of suspiciousness to the situation.
You can also transform the adjective ‘weird’ into a noun to make the word ‘weirdness.’ A noun is a word that names something - a person, a thing, an object, a situation, and so on. See the following example:
To add to the weirdness of the situation, my partner started waking up in the middle of the night.
You could also add an adjective into the first clause to qualify the noun ‘weirdness.’ For example:
To add to the increasing weirdness of the situation, my partner started waking up in the middle of the night.
Comparatives are used, as you may have guessed, to compare two things in a sentence. You can also use them to describe the phenomenon of something increasing in that particular quality.
A superlative is a level up from a comparative, showing that the subject is the most or least of something.
‘Weird’ can take on the form of both of these.
First, let’s have an example of ‘weird’ as a comparative:
In the first example, the speaker explains that they found the last play weird, but this one even more so.
In the second example, it’s clear that Ben’s behavior was weird before, but it is getting weirder. Hence the use of a superlative to show the increasing weirdness of Ben’s behavior.
Let’s see now an example of ‘weird’ as a superlative:
That’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever heard.
Nothing is weirder than what this speaker just heard. That’s when the use of superlatives comes in: when nothing can top it.
You can also turn the word ‘weird’ into verb form with some tweaking.
‘To Weird Out’ means to provoke in someone a sensation of uneasiness or to experience an odd feeling.
We could go on and on about the meaning of the word and the various forms it can take on. But we’ll leave it here for now, as we believe we have accomplished our primary aim for this article: to clarify the correct spelling of the word.
To summarize: the word ‘weird’ is always spelled that way, with the ‘e’ before the ‘i’. It is never correct to spell it ‘wierd,’ and if it were to be spelled that way, it would be considered an error.
‘Weird’ is an adjective, but you can transform the word into other types of words depending on your needs.
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