Admitting

How to spell admitting

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce admitting

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does admitting mean?

1. verbConceding or acknowledging something to be true, often reluctantly.
2. verbAllowing a person or thing to enter a place.

Admitting in a sentence

• Without admitting any fault, the company offered a refund.

• The venue was admitting guests only after their tickets were scanned.

• She finished the report while admitting that the deadline had slipped.

• The hospital began admitting visitors again after the restrictions eased.

Where does admitting come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of 'admit', which English took from the Latin verb admittere, meaning 'to let in' or 'to allow to enter'. That verb was built from the prefix ad-, meaning 'to' or 'toward', joined to mittere, meaning 'to send' or 'to let go', so the literal idea was of sending someone toward you or letting them through the door. English adopted it in the late 1300s, at first in the sense of granting entry, and the meaning soon broadened to allowing an idea to be true, that is, conceding or confessing a point. The same mittere root powers a whole family of English words, including 'mission', 'permit', 'transmit', and 'submit', all carrying that core notion of sending. The doubled t in 'admitting' is the spelling trap: because 'admit' ends in a single stressed vowel plus a single consonant, the final t doubles before -ing, exactly as in 'permitting' and 'committing'.

How the word is built

• ad- (to)
• mitt (from Latin mittere: to send, let go)
• -ing (present participle suffix, with doubled t)