Donut

How to spell donut

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce donut

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does donut mean?

1. nounA small ring or ball of sweetened fried dough, often glazed or filled.

Donut in a sentence

• She grabbed a chocolate donut with her morning coffee.

• The bakery sells a jam-filled donut for a dollar.

Where does donut come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word began as 'doughnut', a plain compound of 'dough', the soft flour-and-water mixture from Old English 'dag', and 'nut', the small rounded seed from Old English 'hnutu'. The earliest American examples from the early 1800s described little balls or knots of fried sweet dough, and the 'nut' likely referred to their small, rounded shape rather than to any actual nut. As the treat became an American icon, the spelling was trimmed to the phonetic 'donut', a shortening that appears in the later 1800s and was pushed hard by twentieth-century shops and brands that liked its snappy look on signs. The simplified form keeps the sound while dropping the silent 'gh' that trips writers up in 'doughnut'. Both spellings still coexist, with 'donut' dominating American casual usage and on storefronts.

How the word is built

• dough (the flour mixture)
• nut (small rounded shape); 'donut' is the simplified respelling of 'doughnut'