Endlessly

How to spell endlessly

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce endlessly

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does endlessly mean?

1. adverbIn a way that seems to continue or be repeated without ever stopping.

Endlessly in a sentence

• The toddler asked questions endlessly on the long car journey.

• The call centre kept him on hold endlessly before anyone answered.

Where does endlessly come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word is built from the native English noun 'end', which comes from the Old English 'ende', meaning a boundary, a limit, or the final point of something, and which traces back to a common Germanic root shared by the Dutch 'einde' and the German 'Ende'. To this core English added two old and very productive native suffixes: '-less', from Old English 'leas' meaning 'free from' or 'without', and '-ly', from Old English 'lice' meaning 'in the manner of'. Stacked together they yield the literal sense of 'in a manner without end', which is exactly what the modern adverb means. Because every piece is plain Old English rather than a borrowing, the spelling is regular and phonetic; the only thing to watch is keeping the double consonant of '-less' intact, since the stem already ends in a single 's' sound. The same '-less' building block sits inside everyday relatives such as 'hopeless', 'careless', and 'restless'.

How the word is built

• end (from Old English ende: boundary, limit)
• -less (without)
• -ly (adverb suffix)