Accept or except?
accept is a verb meaning “To receive, especially with a consent, with favour, or with approval”; except is a preposition meaning “Used to introduce an exception or qualification to something previously stated”. Use accept as a verb and except as a preposition (except is also a verb: “To exclude; to specify as being an exception”). In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) except is about as common as accept.
What is the difference between accept and except?
| accept | except | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | verb, adjective, noun | verb, preposition, conjunction |
| Meaning | To receive, especially with a consent, with favour, or with approval To admit to a place or a group Something that is accepted | To exclude; to specify as being an exception To take exception, to object (to or against) Used to introduce an exception or qualification to something previously stated |
| Example | The Boy Scouts were going to accept him as a member | I find most people annoying – present company excepted, of course! |
| Forms | accepts, accepting, accepted | excepts, excepting, excepted |
| Pronunciation | /əkˈsɛpt/ /ækˈsɛpt/ | /ɪkˈsɛpt/ /ɛkˈsɛpt/ |
| In writing | 71 times per million words | 105 times per million words |
Sources: accept and except in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of accept and except
accept
- 1
To receive, especially with a consent, with favour, or with approval
- 2
Something that is accepted
- 3
To admit to a place or a group
The Boy Scouts were going to accept him as a member
- 4
To regard as proper, usual, true, or to believe in
I accept the notion that Christ lived
- 5
To receive as adequate or satisfactory
- 6
To receive or admit to; to agree to; to assent to; to submit to
I accept your proposal, amendment, or excuse
- 7
To endure patiently
I accept my punishment
- 8
To acknowledge patiently without opposition or resistance
We need to accept the fact that restaurants are closed due to COVID-19 and that no amount of wishing or screaming will make them reopen any sooner
except
- 1
To exclude; to specify as being an exception
I find most people annoying – present company excepted, of course!
- 2
Used to introduce an exception or qualification to something previously stated
There was nothing in the cupboard except a tin of beans
- 3
Used to introduce a clause, phrase, verb infinitive, adverb or other non-noun complement forming an exception or qualification to something previously stated
You look a bit like my sister, except (that) she has longer hair
- 4
To take exception, to object (to or against)
to except to a witness or his testimony
- 5
informalLoosely, used to introduce a contrastive statement explaining why something wasn't successful, didn't happen, etc
They fired tear gas at us, except the wind was blowing the wrong way
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, accept or except?
accept appears 71 times per million words; except 105 times per million words.
accept 71 times per million wordsexcept 105 times per million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search accept vs except?
“accept vs except” is searched about 6,600 times a month on Google and 300 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“except vs accept”, “accept or except”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.