Spinoff

How to spell spinoff

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce spinoff

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does spinoff mean?

1. nounA product, benefit, or result that develops incidentally from a larger project or activity.
2. nounA television series, film, or book based on characters or settings from an earlier one.
3. nounA new independent company created by separating a division from its parent business.

Spinoff in a sentence

• The new coating was a useful spinoff of the space research programme.

• The popular detective got his own spinoff after the original series ended.

• Shareholders approved the spinoff of the software division as a separate company.

• Better local transport was a welcome spinoff of the stadium development.

• The studio commissioned a spinoff focused on the younger characters.

• The spinoff began trading on the stock exchange under its own name.

Where does spinoff come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a modern compound built from two very old native English elements. The verb 'spin' descends from the Old English spinnan, meaning to draw out and twist fibre into thread, and the particle 'off' comes from the Old English of, meaning away or apart. The figurative sense of throwing something off as a by-product gave rise to 'spin-off' in twentieth-century American usage, first in business around the 1950s to describe a new company separated from a parent firm, and soon afterwards in broadcasting for a programme derived from an existing one. Because both parts are everyday words, the only real spelling question is whether to set it solid as 'spinoff', hyphenate it as 'spin-off', or split it into two words; this entry treats the solid form as authoritative. The image behind it is neatly literal: something spun off and sent on its own way.

How the word is built

• spin (to rotate; figuratively to derive)
• off (away, separated)