Culture

British - American English - Spelling Rules

There are some spelling differences in American English. In the 1800's, the US Congress actually called for several changes to make words more phonetic. Look at the following examples:

British English American English Example (British - American)

1 words ending in -re change to -er
centre - center
metre - meter
2 words ending in -our change to -or
colour - color
3 words ending in -ogue change to -og
catalogue - catalog
4 words ending in -ise/ize ending only in -ize
realise/realize - realize
5 final -l doubled after short vowel
travelled - traveled
modelling - modeling
6 words ending in -ence change to -ense
defence - defense
licence - license

Look at the followings lists for words which have different meanings or are spelled differently in British and American English:

BRITISH-AMERICAN words