Gauge

How to spell gauge

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce gauge

What does gauge mean?

1. verbTo measure something precisely, or to estimate or judge it carefully.
2. nounAn instrument that measures and displays a quantity, or a standard measurement of size, thickness, or distance.

Gauge in a sentence

• verb

  Engineers use sensors to gauge the pressure inside the pipe.

• noun

  The fuel gauge on the dashboard dropped to empty.

• verb

  She paused to gauge the mood of the room before speaking.

• noun

  Thinner wire has a higher gauge number.

Where does gauge come from?

Language of origin: French

This word came into English in the 1400s from Old Northern French 'gauge' (also spelled 'jauge'), a noun meaning a fixed measure or standard for checking quantities such as the contents of a barrel. The Old French verb 'gauger' meant 'to measure or test against a standard', and customs officials literally gauged casks of wine to assess them for tax. The deeper origin is uncertain and probably Germanic, perhaps from a Frankish root tied to the idea of a measuring rod or the rim of a vessel, which is why dictionaries hedge on its earliest ancestor. From the sense of an official measure the word broadened to mean any instrument that shows a quantity, then the thickness of wire, the bore of a gun, and the distance between rails. The unusual 'au' spelling is a leftover from its French route into English, and because the simpler variant 'gage' also existed historically, the 'au' is exactly the part that trips up modern writers.

How the word is built

• gauge (single root from Old French; not formed from a prefix or suffix, the tricky 'au' belongs to the original root)

British and American spelling

Gauge is the British spelling. American English spells it gage.