Modal

How to spell modal

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce modal

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does modal mean?

1. adjectiveRelating to a mode, manner, or form rather than to substance or content.
2. adjectiveDescribing an auxiliary verb, such as can, must, or should, that expresses possibility, permission, or obligation.
3. adjectiveRelating to the mode, the value that occurs most frequently in a data set.

Modal in a sentence

• The survey measured modal differences in how people commute to work.

• The grammar lesson focused on how a modal verb signals obligation or permission.

• The modal value of the dataset was the score that appeared most often.

• The report compared the modal split between road, rail, and air transport.

• She underlined every modal verb in the contract to check its exact force.

• Analysts reported the modal income alongside the average and the median.

Where does modal come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin modus, which literally meant a measure, a limit, or a manner of doing something, and it is the same root that gives us 'mode', 'moderate', and 'modify'. Medieval scholars built the Latin adjective modalis to describe something concerned with a 'mode' or manner rather than with substance, and the word entered English in the late 1500s through the technical vocabulary of logic and philosophy. From there it spread into grammar, where it labels the verbs (such as can, must, and should) that express the manner or mood of an action, and into music, where it refers to scales built on the old modes. In statistics it later took on the precise meaning of relating to the mode, the value that occurs most often in a set. The spelling stays close to its parent 'mode', so remembering the single 'd' and the plain '-al' ending follows naturally if you picture mode plus al.

How the word is built

• mod- (from Latin modus: measure, manner, mode)
• -al (adjective/noun suffix)