Hand over or handover?
hand over is a verb meaning “To relinquish control or possession of something to someone”; handover is a noun meaning “The transference of authority, control, power or knowledge from one agency to…”. Use hand over as a verb and handover as a noun. hand over is written as two words and handover as one word; they are used differently.
What is the difference between hand over and handover?
| hand over | handover | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | verb, noun | noun |
| Meaning | To relinquish control or possession of something to someone To deliver (someone to an enemy, police, etc.) | The transference of authority, control, power or knowledge from one agency to another, or from one state to another The information passed on in such a case |
| Example | I handed over the controls to the copilot | The daytime team got an urgent handover from the afterhours department |
| Forms | none | handovers |
| Pronunciation | not recorded | /ˈhændˌoʊvɚ/ |
| In writing | not counted (the list counts single words) | about once in every 1 million words |
Sources: hand over and handover 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 hand over and handover
hand over
- 1
To relinquish control or possession of something to someone
I handed over the controls to the copilot
- 2
Alternative spelling of handover
- 3
To deliver (someone to an enemy, police, etc.)
handover
- 1
The transference of authority, control, power or knowledge from one agency to another, or from one state to another
- 2
The information passed on in such a case
The daytime team got an urgent handover from the afterhours department
- 3
the process of transferring an ongoing call or data session from one channel connected to the core network to another channel
- 4
the process of transferring satellite control responsibility from one earth station to another without loss or interruption of service
- 5
The transfer of goods from the dealer to the purchaser, often of illegal goods
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, hand over or handover?
hand over is a phrase, which the list of single words does not count; handover about once in every 1 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 hand over vs handover?
“hand over vs handover” is searched about 10 times a month on Google and 10 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“handover vs hand over”, “hand over or handover”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.