Renew

How to spell renew

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce renew

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does renew mean?

1. verbTo extend the period of something such as a licence or subscription, or to restore something to a fresh condition.

Renew in a sentence

• I need to renew my passport before the trip next spring.

• The gym lets members renew their annual contract online.

Where does renew come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word was built in Middle English as renewen, joining the prefix re-, meaning 'again' or 'back', to the familiar adjective new, which descends from the Old English neowe and ultimately from a much older Germanic root for 'fresh' or 'recent'. The construction was almost certainly shaped on the model of the Latin renovare, 'to make new again', which is the same root that gives English renovate, so renew and renovate are essentially the same idea borrowed at different times and through different routes. From its earliest English use in the 1300s it carried the sense of restoring something to a fresh or original condition, whether a building, a friendship, or a vow. Over time it gathered the very common modern meanings of extending a licence, subscription, or contract for a further period. The spelling is reassuringly transparent: it is simply re plus new with no silent letters, and the only real hesitation is whether to add an extra letter that the word does not actually need.

How the word is built

• re- (again)
• new (root: fresh, recent, from Old English neowe)