Orbit

How to spell orbit

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce orbit

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does orbit mean?

1. nounThe curved path one object follows around another, such as a planet around a star or a satellite around the earth.
2. verbTo move in a curved path around another object.

Orbit in a sentence

• noun

  The satellite settled into a stable orbit above the planet.

• verb

  Hundreds of satellites now orbit the earth at different altitudes.

• noun

  The moon completes one orbit of the earth roughly every month.

• verb

  The comet will orbit the sun once every seventy years.

Where does orbit come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word comes from the Latin orbita, which meant the rut or track left by a wheel, and by extension any circular course or path. That noun was built on orbis, the Latin word for a circle, ring, or disk, the same root that gives English the word 'orb' for a sphere. For centuries the term was used in anatomy for the bony socket that holds the eye, since that hollow is roughly circular. The astronomical sense, the curved path one body follows around another, took hold in the late seventeenth century as scientists described the motion of planets. The single 'b' and the unstressed second syllable are the main spelling pitfalls, since the ending sounds like a faint 'it' rather than a clearly written 'orbit'.

How the word is built

• orbit (from Latin orbita: wheel track, course) ultimately from orb (circle, ring)