Favourite
The British spelling, keeping the French U
Favorite
The American spelling, and the older Latin form
Key difference: Both are standard. Favourite is British and Commonwealth usage, favorite American — and in code the American spelling is fixed everywhere, as in favicon.
Both spellings are standard: favourite in Britain and the Commonwealth, favorite in the United States. As with colour, the U came from French and Latin never had it. In code the American form is fixed for everyone — the file is called favicon, in London as much as in Chicago.
Favourite is one of the most frequent words in the -our family, which makes it the one British writers see corrected most often by software set to American English by default. It is not a correction. Both spellings have been standard for two centuries.
Which Spelling Is Correct?
- Favourite — United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Canada.
- Favorite — United States.
The same line runs through favourable / favorable and favouritism / favoritism.
Where the U Went
The whole family entered English through French. Latin favor had no U; Old French added one; Middle English borrowed the French spelling along with the word. The same route produced colour, honour, labour and neighbour.
Noah Webster stripped the U out in his dictionaries of 1806 and 1828, arguing that English had no reason to preserve French orthography. His spelling book carried the reform into American classrooms, and it stuck there and nowhere else. The full story of the split is in colour vs color, which is the same reform applied to the same ending.
The point worth repeating is the one that reverses expectations: the American spelling is older, in the sense that it matches the Latin. The U is the addition.
The Word Meant a Person First
Favourite arrived in English in the late sixteenth century, and its first meaning was not a thing you prefer. It meant a person singled out by a monarch — the royal favourite, elevated by proximity rather than merit, and generally resented by everyone else at court.
That older sense is still live in historical writing, where a favourite is a courtier rather than a preference. The modern meaning — the thing you like best — grew out of it, and the racing sense, the horse most likely to win, came later still.
It is a useful reminder that the word carries an idea of being chosen by someone, not merely of being liked. A favourite is picked out.
The One Place British Writers Use the American Spelling
In code and file names, favorite is fixed for everybody.
Early versions of Internet Explorer called bookmarks Favorites, and the small icon shown beside a site's name in a browser tab is stored as favicon.ico — a contraction of favorite icon. The name became a web standard, so a British developer writes:
"Add your favourite pages to the sidebar." — prose, British
<link rel="icon" href="/favicon.ico">— markup, American
That is not inconsistency. Prose follows the reader; identifiers follow the specification, and the specification was written in American English.
Favourite and Favorite in Real Sentences
British:
- "Her favourite chapter is the one everyone skips."
- "The reforms were viewed favourably, which surprised the cabinet."
American:
- "It's my favorite album by a distance."
- "He showed obvious favoritism toward the younger staff."
Favourite vs Favorite: Side by Side
| Favourite | Favorite | |
|---|---|---|
| Region | UK, Ireland, Australia, NZ, South Africa, India, Canada | United States |
| Origin | Old French, which added the U | Latin favor, without it |
| Related forms | favourable, favouritism | favorable, favoritism |
| In code | favicon — American everywhere | favicon |
| First meaning | a monarch's chosen courtier | same |
A Memory Hook That Sticks
U is for United Kingdom — the same hook that covers colour, honour, labour and the rest of the family in one move. If the country has a U, the word keeps one.
And for the exception: favicon has no room for a U, in any country.
Related Spelling Mixups
Colour vs color is the same ending and the same reform, with the additional twist that British English drops the U itself before certain suffixes. Centre vs center and defence vs defense complete the picture of Webster's programme, and all three are set out in the guide to commonly confused words.
Conclusion
Neither spelling is wrong, and the American one is not a shortening of the British one — the U was the addition, made by French, and Webster took it back out.
Write for your reader, keep it consistent, and make one exception without guilt: when you name a file, the whole world writes favicon.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is favourite or favorite correct?
Both. Favourite is standard in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India and Canada; favorite is standard in the United States. They are the same word, and the only mistake is using both in one piece of writing.
Why does American English drop the U?
Noah Webster removed it deliberately across the whole -our family in his 1806 and 1828 dictionaries, arguing that the U was a French import with no business in English. Latin had favor without a U, so the American spelling is closer to the classical form — the opposite of what most people assume about it.
Which other words follow the same pattern?
The -our family is large: colour, honour, labour, neighbour, flavour, behaviour, harbour, rumour, humour, endeavour. All drop the U in American English. The related adjective favourable and favorable splits the same way, as does favourite's cousin favouritism.
Did favourite always mean something you like best?
No. It entered English in the late sixteenth century meaning a person singled out for special treatment by a monarch — a royal favourite, often resented at court. The sense of a preferred thing rather than a preferred person came later, and the racing sense of the horse most likely to win is later still.
Which spelling should software and websites use?
Follow your audience, with one exception: in code, favorite is effectively fixed. Browser bookmarks were called Favorites in early Internet Explorer, and the file favicon.ico takes its name from the same word. British developers therefore write favourite in prose and favorite in markup, which is correct rather than inconsistent.
Part of Commonly Confused Words & Spelling.
Keep exploring
Colour or Color: Which Spelling Should You Use?
Both are correct. Colour is British, color American — and the American form is the older Latin one, restored on purpose by Noah Webster.
Commonly Confused Words in English: The Complete Guide
The commonly confused words of English, sorted into eight families, with the spelling rules that hold, the ones that fail, and the history behind both.