Entrepreneur

How to spell entrepreneur

12 letters · 4 syllables

73 of the 177 people asked to spell entrepreneur in Spelling Garden got it wrong the first time.

The most common mistake is entrepeneur. The letters people get wrong are highlighted.

entrepeneur entrepreneur

What people typed instead

• entrepeneur21 people
• entreprenuer7 people

How to pronounce entrepreneur

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does entrepreneur mean?

1. nounA person who sets up and runs a business venture, taking on financial risk in the hope of profit.

Entrepreneur in a sentence

• She is a successful entrepreneur who has founded three companies.

• The young entrepreneur launched her first product at sixteen.

• Every entrepreneur needs both vision and patience.

Where does entrepreneur come from?

Language of origin: French

This word comes directly from French, where entrepreneur literally meant 'one who undertakes', formed from the verb entreprendre, 'to undertake' or 'to take in hand'. That verb breaks down into entre, meaning 'between', and prendre, meaning 'to take', the same prendre that gives us 'comprehend' and 'apprehend'. English borrowed entrepreneur in the early 1800s, at first simply for the manager or organiser of a musical or theatrical production, before economists broadened it to mean a person who sets up a business venture and shoulders its financial risk. The unfamiliar French spelling is precisely the trap: the silent middle of 'entre-', the buried 'pren', and the final '-eur' all fight against English instincts to write '-er'. It is a close relative of 'enterprise', which travelled the same French route from the same 'undertaking' idea.

How the word is built

• entre- (between)
• prendre/pren (to take)
• -eur (agent suffix: one who does)

People who misspell entrepreneur also struggle with

Of the Spelling Garden players who got entrepreneur wrong the first time, this is how many also got each of these wrong.

• supersede 95% of them got it wrong
• reconnaissance 94% of them got it wrong
• millennium 94% of them got it wrong
• idiosyncrasy 93% of them got it wrong
• bourgeois 92% of them got it wrong
• connoisseur 91% of them got it wrong