Analogue

How to spell analogue

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce analogue

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does analogue mean?

1. nounA person or thing seen as comparable to or corresponding with another.
2. adjectiveRelating to information or signals represented by a continuously variable physical quantity, rather than by digital values.

Analogue in a sentence

• noun

  The human heart has a mechanical analogue in the pump that drives the system.

• adjective

  She prefers an analogue watch with hands to a digital display.

• noun

  Researchers studied the rat brain as an analogue for human memory.

• adjective

  The studio still records onto analogue tape for a warmer sound.

Where does analogue come from?

Language of origin: Greek

The word travelled into English from the Greek analogos, which meant 'proportionate' or 'corresponding', built from ana- 'according to' and logos, a word with a huge range of meanings including 'ratio', 'proportion', 'reckoning' and 'word'. The original sense was mathematical: two things stood in analogue relation when they shared the same ratio. English picked it up in the 1800s by way of the French analogue, and the French shaping is exactly why the British and Canadian spelling keeps that quiet -ue tail on the end. From the idea of corresponding proportions came the modern noun, a thing comparable to another, and later the technical adjective for signals that vary continuously rather than in digital steps, as on a clock with sweeping hands. The same logos root surfaces in a crowd of relatives such as logic, catalogue and dialogue, which all share the habit of that -gue ending that catches writers out.

How the word is built

• ana- (according to, in proportion)
• log (Greek logos: ratio, proportion, word)
• -ue (silent French-style ending)

British and American spelling

Analogue is the British spelling. American English spells it analog.