Everyday OR Every day (See more…)

 ‘Everyday’ and ‘Every day’ are two commonly confused words but the two words not only have distinct meanings but also differ significantly both in usage and spelling.

‘Everyday’ describes something as ordinary, routine, common, etc.

‘Every day’ could mean something that happens on a daily basis.  

The key difference between the two words lies in the context.

It is wrongly believed that ‘everyday’ (one word) and ‘every day’ (two words) share the same meaning and usage pattern. As a result, people use these two expressions interchangeably. It is now common usage in informal writing. But this is wrong.

Let us illustrate this with some examples.

For ‘everyday’ (one word), we can say:

Everyday people.

Everyday food.

Everyday struggles.

In these examples, ‘everyday’ is used as a word (an adjective) to describe or qualify the words (nouns) that come after it.

‘Everyday’ here, means ordinary, routine, etc.

For ‘every day’ (two words), we can say:

I go to work every day.

I eat every day.

In these examples, ‘every day’ is used as a word (an adverb) to add more meaning to the above two sentences. ‘Every day’ here means each day, daily, etc. 

In formal writing or when precision matters, using the correct forms of ‘everyday’ and ‘every day’ helps to convey the intended meaning accurately.