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Dependant or dependent?

In American English write dependent; in British and Commonwealth English, dependant. dependant is a noun meaning “UK and Commonwealth standard spelling of dependent”; dependent is a noun meaning “A person who relies on another for support or sustenance, particularly…”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) dependent is about 22 times as common as dependant.

dependantordependent

What is the difference between dependant and dependent?

dependantdependent
Part of speechnounadjective, noun
Meaning

UK and Commonwealth standard spelling of dependent

Relying upon; depending upon

Having a probability that is affected by the outcome of a separate event

USA person who relies on another for support or sustenance, particularly financial support

Examplenone recordedAt that point I was dependent on financial aid for my tuition
Formsdependantsdependents
Pronunciation/dɪˈpɛndənt//dɪˈpɛndənt/
Regionno labelUS
In writingabout once in every 1 million words19 times per million words

Sources: dependant and dependent 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 dependant and dependent

dependant

  1. 1

    noun UK and Commonwealth standard spelling of dependent

dependent

  1. 1

    adjective Relying upon; depending upon

    At that point I was dependent on financial aid for my tuition

  2. 2

    noun USA person who relies on another for support or sustenance, particularly financial support

    With two children and an ailing mother, she had three dependents in all

  3. 3

    adjective Having a probability that is affected by the outcome of a separate event

  4. 4

    noun USAn element in phrase or clause structure that is not the head. Includes complements, modifiers and determiners

  5. 5

    adjective Used after a particle (with one or two exceptions), such as those which express questions, subordinate clauses, and negative sentences

  6. 6

    noun USThe aorist subjunctive or subjunctive perfective: a form of a verb not used independently but preceded by a particle to form the negative or a tense form. Found in Greek and in the Gaelic languages

  7. 7

    adjective Of part of the body: positioned lower than the heart, like the legs while standing up, or the back while supine

  8. 8

    noun USdependent (origination), in Buddhism, the idea that the existence of everything is conditional and dependent on a cause, and that nothing happens fortuitously or by chance

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, dependant or dependent?

dependant appears about once in every 1 million words; dependent 19 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 dependant vs dependent?

“dependant vs dependent” is searched about 5,400 times a month on Google (Bing reports no separate figure) in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“dependent vs dependant”, “dependant or dependent”).

Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.

The words