Aware

How to spell aware

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce aware

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does aware mean?

1. adjectiveHaving knowledge or perception of a situation or fact.

Aware in a sentence

• The manager was fully aware of the budget shortfall.

• Few travellers are aware of the new airport fees.

Where does aware come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word descends from the Old English gewær, which meant watchful, wary, or on one's guard. The root wær carried the sense of being cautious and alert to danger, and it is the same element that survives in the modern words 'wary' and 'beware'. Over time the prefixed form lost its early ge- (which softened into a simple a- sound) and the meaning broadened from physical vigilance against threats to the general mental state of knowing or noticing something. The word belongs to a wider Germanic family, sharing an ancestor with the German 'gewahr', meaning conscious or perceiving. Because the spelling looks just as it sounds, the only mild trap is the final '-are' ending, which mirrors 'beware' rather than the '-air' of unrelated words.

How the word is built

• a- (intensive prefix, from Old English ge-)
• ware (from Old English wær: watchful, cautious)