No

How to spell no

2 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce no

What does no mean?

1. determinerNot any; not a single one of something.
2. interjectionA word used to give a negative answer, to refuse, or to decline.

No in a sentence

• determiner

  I said no to the second helping.

• interjection

  The committee voted no on the new proposal.

• determiner

  There's no way I can finish this today.

• determiner

  No smoking is allowed inside.

• determiner

  She had no idea what to do next.

• determiner

  There were no seats left on the bus.

Where does no come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word descends from Old English na, a fusion of ne, meaning 'not', and a, meaning 'ever' or 'always', so the original force was something close to 'not ever'. That ne is one of the oldest negative particles in the Germanic and wider Indo-European family, the same element that lurks inside 'never', 'neither', and 'none'. Over time na was worn down to the short modern form 'no', shedding its length but keeping its blunt finality. The closely related 'not' grew from the same negative stem by way of 'nought'. The persistent spelling trap is not the word itself but its homophone 'know', where a silent k survives from a time when that opening sound was actually pronounced.

How the word is built

• no (a single, ancient particle of negation; not built from separable parts)

Words that sound like no

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• know: To have information, understanding, or awareness of something, or to be acquainted with someone.