Influx

How to spell influx

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce influx

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does influx mean?

1. nounA sudden arrival or inflow of a large number of people or things.

Influx in a sentence

• The festival brought a sudden influx of tourists into the small town.

• The charity struggled to manage the influx of donations after the appeal.

Where does influx come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes from the Latin influxus, the past participle of influere, which meant literally 'to flow into'. That verb was built from the prefix in-, meaning 'in' or 'into', joined to fluere, meaning 'to flow', the same root that gives us 'fluid', 'fluent', and 'fluctuate'. In its earliest English use, around the early 1600s, influx kept a very physical sense of one stream of water flowing into another or into the sea. Over time the meaning broadened from literal liquids to any large arrival or inpouring, so today we speak of an influx of people, money, or messages. The spelling preserves the Latin -flux ending directly, which is the part that trips writers who expect a more English-looking 'flucks' or 'influcks'.

How the word is built

• in- (in, into)
• flux (a flowing, from Latin fluere: to flow)