Statewide

How to spell statewide

9 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce statewide

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does statewide mean?

1. adjectiveExtending throughout or affecting an entire state.
2. adverbAcross or throughout the whole of a state.

Statewide in a sentence

• adjective

  The agency launched a statewide campaign to register new voters.

• adverb

  The new policy will roll out statewide next month.

• adjective

  A statewide ban on outdoor burning took effect during the drought.

• adverb

  Sales of the product grew statewide after the advertising push.

Where does statewide come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a modern compound built from two long-established English words. The first element, 'state', came into English in the 1200s through Old French 'estat' from the Latin 'status', meaning 'condition, position, or standing', itself from 'stare', 'to stand'; over time it grew the political sense of a self-governing region. The second element, 'wide', is a native Old English word, 'wīd', meaning 'broad' or 'far-reaching', and it is the same root that gives us 'width' and 'widen'. Joining the two produced an adjective meaning 'spread across an entire state', a formation that emerged in American English in the late 1800s alongside similar coinages such as 'nationwide' and 'worldwide'. The spelling is straightforward once you remember it is written solid, with no hyphen and no extra letters: just 'state' followed by 'wide'.

How the word is built

• state (a political region)
• wide (extending across; from Old English wīd 'broad, far-reaching')