Meanwhile

How to spell meanwhile

9 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce meanwhile

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does meanwhile mean?

1. adverbDuring the intervening period, or at the same time as something else.

Meanwhile in a sentence

• The cake baked slowly; meanwhile, she tidied the kitchen.

• The report is being reviewed, and meanwhile the team waits for approval.

Where does meanwhile come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word is a compound built from two native English elements that have been around since Anglo-Saxon times. The first part, 'mean', here has nothing to do with cruelty or averages; it comes from an Old English sense meaning 'middle' or 'intervening', the same notion preserved in phrases like 'the mean time'. The second part, 'while', descends from the Old English hwīl, meaning 'a period of time' or 'a space of time'. Speakers fused the two into the phrase 'mene while' during the Middle English period, literally 'the intervening period', and over the centuries it hardened into the single adverb we write today. Because it is a transparent compound of two familiar words, the only real spelling trap is remembering that it stays one solid word with the 'while' spelled w-h-i-l-e.

How the word is built

• mean (from Old English mǣne: middle, intervening)
• while (from hwīl: a period of time)