Maximizing

How to spell maximizing

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce maximizing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does maximizing mean?

1. verbMaking something as large, high, or effective as possible.

Maximizing in a sentence

• The new layout is aimed at maximizing floor space in the warehouse.

• She spent the meeting maximizing the return on every pound invested.

Where does maximizing come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin maximus, meaning 'greatest', the superlative of magnus, 'great' or 'large', which also gives us 'magnify' and 'magnitude'. In the early 1800s English coined the verb 'maximize' to mean 'to make as great as possible', deliberately building it as the opposite number to 'minimize', which had been formed from minimus, 'smallest'. The verb-forming ending -ize comes ultimately from the Greek -izein, an ending used to turn nouns and adjectives into verbs of action, and it reached English through Latin and French. The present participle 'maximizing' simply adds -ing, dropping the silent final -e of 'maximize' before the suffix. The spelling trap sits in that middle vowel: the unstressed -im- sounds like a faint schwa, so writers sometimes drop or alter it, and the -iz- can be tempting to write as -is- for those used to British -ise forms.

How the word is built

• maxim- (from Latin maximus: greatest)
• -ize (verb-forming suffix)
• -ing (present participle)

British and American spelling

Maximizing is the American spelling. British English spells it maximising.