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I have been using Realise and Realize interchangeably. Is one more correct over other and when to use exactly what ?

rahulaga-msft
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    One is British standard spelling, and the other American. If you look up a definition online you should find some good explanations. – 1006a Apr 04 '18 at 13:56
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    Note that there is no difference besides the spelling difference. The pronunciation is unchanged, and so is the meaning. Both spellings are allowed, and both are accepted, so pick one and use it yourself exclusively. Ignore it when others use a different spelling, the way you would ignore a British accent if you were American, or vice versa. – John Lawler Apr 04 '18 at 14:20
  • @John Lawler Last time I was in the States, I made every effort to blend in. Wore a cowboy hat. Called pavements sidewalks and geysers geysers. Didn't impress the other people on the coach (bus at the time) much (mainly New Zealanders). – Edwin Ashworth Apr 04 '18 at 15:18
  • Possible duplicate of Are the endings "-zation" and "-sation" interchangeable? (there are plenty of closer-looking candidates, all closed as duplicates of this). – Edwin Ashworth Apr 04 '18 at 15:21

2 Answers2

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In British English you should use the suffix -ize- for all those words that derive from Greek.

Other words should be spelt with –ise.

The following are always—ise:

advertise, advise, apprise, arise, clockwise,

comprise, compromise, concise (adj), despise, devise,

disenfranchise, disfranchise, disguise, enfranchise, enterprise (n),

excise, exercise, expertise (n), franchise, improvise, 

merchandise, otherwise, precise (adj), premise, revise, 

supervise, surmise, surprise, televise,  wise.

This is what I found out...true or false? Sounds plausible.

Keith Wood
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  • If it's a rule, I'll just give up British English (whatever that is defined as at the moment). But happily, it's not. Brits are well known for waiving the rules. – Edwin Ashworth Apr 04 '18 at 15:24
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A wealth of information can be found at Grammarist about the -ise and -ize in the English language.

Although realize is now regarded by many in the U.K. and Australasia as the American spelling, it is not an Americanism. In fact, the -ize spelling variant is older than –ise — realize predates the United States and Canada by nearly two centuries — and has been the preferred spelling throughout most of the word’s history in English. If we can believe the ngram below, which graphs the use of realize and realise in British books and journals published between 1800 and 2000, realise had a brief ascendancy in British English from the late 19th century through the early 20th, but realize was preferred before around 1875 and is again preferred today—perhaps because of the influence of dictionaries like Oxford, Cambridge, and Collins, which encourage -ize over -ise.

Here's the link to the American English use of -ise and -ize at Google's Ngram viewer.

For comparison, here's the link to the British English usage.

IconDaemon
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    Actually, if you check so-called "British" hits for "realize" you find many American works or journal articles by Americans. To get a more accurate picture would require a different corpus. – KarlG Apr 04 '18 at 14:50
  • One has to be careful of exceptions to this. For example, it's always "advertise", with an "s"; the same as true for verbs where "-ise" or "-ize" isn't a suffix, as in "advise" and "surprise" and "prize". These are spelled the same way throughout the English-speaking world. – Green Grasso Holm Apr 04 '18 at 14:55