Efficient

How to spell efficient

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce efficient

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does efficient mean?

1. adjectiveAchieving maximum results with the least waste of time, money, or effort.

Efficient in a sentence

• The new heating system is far more efficient than the old boiler.

• A more efficient workflow let the team finish the project early.

Where does efficient come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word comes from the Latin efficientem, the accusative form of efficiens, which was the present participle of the verb efficere, meaning 'to work out', 'to bring about', or 'to accomplish'. That verb was built from the prefix ex-, meaning 'out', joined to facere, meaning 'to make or to do', so the literal sense was something like 'making a result come out'. English took the word in through Old French in the late 1300s, at first carrying the philosophical idea of a cause that actually produces an effect (the 'efficient cause'). Over time the everyday meaning narrowed to describe a person or system that achieves results with little wasted effort. The same facere root sits inside a large family of relatives such as 'effect', 'fact', and 'manufacture', and it explains the doubled letters in the spelling: the ex- prefix assimilated into ef- before the f of facere, which is why efficient carries a double f.

How the word is built

• ef- (variant of ex-, meaning 'out')
• fic (from Latin facere, 'to make or do')
• -ient (adjective suffix)