Rife

How to spell rife

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce rife

What does rife mean?

1. adjectiveWidespread and very common, usually said of something unwelcome.

Rife in a sentence

• Speculation about the merger was rife across the trading floor.

• Corruption was rife in the department before the audit.

Where does rife come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word comes from Old English rīfe, an adjective meaning 'abundant', 'plentiful', or 'prevalent'. It belongs to the Germanic family and has close cousins in Old Norse rífr, meaning 'abundant' or 'munificent', and in Dutch rijf, meaning 'plentiful'. For most of its history it simply described something present in great quantity, whether good or bad, but over the centuries it drifted toward unwelcome things, so today we usually speak of crime, rumour, or disease being rife. The word is also commonly paired with the phrase 'rife with', meaning full of something undesirable. Because it is short and the spelling follows the regular silent-e pattern that turns the vowel long, the trap is mostly remembering it exists as its own word rather than confusing it with 'ripe' or 'rip'.

How the word is built

• rife (a single Old English root meaning abundant or widespread; no prefix or suffix)