Opportunities

How to spell opportunities

13 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce opportunities

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does opportunities mean?

1. nounFavourable circumstances or chances that make it possible to do something.

Opportunities in a sentence

• The conference offered several opportunities to meet potential clients.

• Moving to the city opened up new career opportunities for her.

Where does opportunities come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word goes back to the Latin opportunitas, meaning 'fitness' or 'a favourable moment', which was built on the adjective opportunus. That adjective described a wind that was 'driving toward the harbour', combining ob- 'toward' with portus 'a port or harbour'; a sailor's good fortune was a wind that carried the ship safely into port, so the word came to mean any favourable circumstance. English took it through Old French opportunite in the late 1300s, keeping the sense of a good chance arising at the right time. The hidden harbour inside the word explains its tricky spelling: the doubled p comes from ob- meeting portus, and writers often forget the second p or the u. The closely related word 'opportune' shares the same Latin root and the same spelling trap.

How the word is built

• op- (from ob-, toward)
• portun (from portus, harbour/port)
• -ity (noun suffix)
• -es (plural)