Stabilise or stabilize?
In American English write stabilize; in British and Commonwealth English, stabilise. stabilise is a verb meaning “Non-Oxford British English standard spelling of stabilize”; stabilize is a verb meaning “To make stable”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) stabilize is about 5.8 times as common as stabilise.
What is the difference between stabilise and stabilize?
| stabilise | stabilize | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | verb | verb |
| Meaning | To make stable To become stable | |
| Example | none recorded | Jody stabilized the table by putting a book under the short leg |
| Forms | stabilises, stabilising, stabilised | stabilizes, stabilizing, stabilized |
| Pronunciation | not recorded | /ˈsteɪ.bəˌlaɪz/ /ˈstæɪ.bəˌlɑez/ [ˈstæɪ̯.bəˌlɑe̯z] |
| Region | UK | no label |
| In writing | about once in every 2 million words | 2.9 times per million words |
Sources: stabilise and stabilize 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 stabilise and stabilize
stabilize
- 1
To make stable
Jody stabilized the table by putting a book under the short leg
- 2
To become stable
The country will stabilize after the next election ends
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, stabilise or stabilize?
stabilise appears about once in every 2 million words; stabilize 2.9 times per million words.
stabilise about once in every 2 million wordsstabilize 2.9 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 stabilise vs stabilize?
“stabilise vs stabilize” 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 (“stabilize vs stabilise”, “stabilise or stabilize”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.