Stationary or stationery?
stationary is an adjective meaning “Not moving”; stationery is a noun meaning “Writing materials, envelopes, office materials”. Use stationary as an adjective and stationery as a noun. They sound the same (/ˈsteɪʃ(ə)n(ə)ɹi/). In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) stationary is about 2.2 times as common as stationery.
What is the difference between stationary and stationery?
| stationary | stationery | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | adjective, noun | noun |
| Meaning | Not moving Incapable of being moved | Writing materials, envelopes, office materials |
| Example | The train remained stationary for a few moments, before lurching forward along the track | When the school year finished, he put all of his stationery away in the loft, as he would have no need for pencils and exercise books… |
| Forms | none | stationeries |
| Pronunciation | /ˈsteɪʃ(ə)n(ə)ɹi/ /ˈsteɪʃəˌnɛɹi/ | /ˈsteɪʃ(ə)n(ə)ɹi/ /ˈsteɪʃənɛɹi/ |
| In writing | 4.3 times per million words | 1.9 times per million words |
Sources: stationary and stationery 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 stationary and stationery
stationary
- 1
Not moving
The train remained stationary for a few moments, before lurching forward along the track
- 2
Incapable of being moved
- 3
Unchanging
- 4
A set which intersects all club sets
stationery
- 1
Writing materials, envelopes, office materials
When the school year finished, he put all of his stationery away in the loft, as he would have no need for pencils and exercise books during the holidays
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, stationary or stationery?
stationary appears 4.3 times per million words; stationery 1.9 times per million words.
stationary 4.3 times per million wordsstationery 1.9 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 stationary vs stationery?
“stationary vs stationery” is searched about 14,800 times a month on Google and 1,070 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“stationery vs stationary”, “stationary or stationery”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.