Co-pilot or copilot?
In American English write copilot; in British and Commonwealth English, co-pilot. co-pilot is a noun meaning “UK standard spelling of copilot”; copilot is a noun meaning “A backup or assistant pilot of an aircraft”. co-pilot is written with a hyphen and copilot as one word; they are used differently.
What is the difference between co-pilot and copilot?
| co-pilot | copilot | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, verb | noun, verb |
| Meaning | UK standard spelling of copilot | A backup or assistant pilot of an aircraft An assistant, especially one that uses artificial intelligence To serve as relief or assistant pilot |
| Example | none recorded | none recorded |
| Forms | co-pilots | copilots |
| Pronunciation | not recorded | not recorded |
| In writing | not counted (the list counts single words) | about once in every 3 million words |
Sources: co-pilot and copilot 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 co-pilot and copilot
co-pilot
- 1
UK standard spelling of copilot
- 2
UK standard spelling of copilot
copilot
- 1
A backup or assistant pilot of an aircraft
- 2
To serve as relief or assistant pilot
- 3
An assistant, especially one that uses artificial intelligence
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, co-pilot or copilot?
co-pilot is a phrase, which the list of single words does not count; copilot about once in every 3 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 co-pilot vs copilot?
“co-pilot vs copilot” is searched about 10 times a month on Google (Bing reports no separate figure) in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“copilot vs co-pilot”, “co-pilot or copilot”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.