Heavier

How to spell heavier

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce heavier

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does heavier mean?

1. adjectiveOf greater weight, force, or intensity than something else.

Heavier in a sentence

• The new sofa is much heavier than the old one, so we needed two people to move it.

• Rainfall this month was far heavier than the seasonal average.

Where does heavier come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is the comparative form of 'heavy', which comes from the Old English 'hefig', meaning 'weighty' or 'burdensome'. That root traces back to a Germanic source linked to 'hebban', the ancestor of the modern verb 'heave', so the original idea was of something that must be lifted with effort. Over time the word broadened from sheer physical weight to figurative burdens such as grief, sleep, and responsibility. The comparative is built simply by adding '-er', but because the base word ends in a consonant plus 'y', that 'y' shifts to an 'i', giving the 'heavi-' spelling that catches people who expect to see the original 'heavy'. The same y-to-i pattern appears in relatives like 'happier' and 'easier', so remembering the rule once covers a whole family of words.

How the word is built

• heav- (from heavy: weighty)
• -ier (comparative suffix, with y changing to i)