What Is a Prefix? (With Explanations and Examples) (2024)

FAQs

What Is a Prefix? (With Explanations and Examples)? ›

A prefix is a letter or group of letters that are added to the beginning of a word to change its meaning. For example, “bi-” is a prefix that means “two.” Therefore, bicycle refers to “a human-powered two-wheeled vehicle.”

Prefixes are one- to three-syllable affixes added to the beginning of a base word to slightly change its meaning. For example, adding the prefix im- to the base word possible creates a new word, impossible, which means “not possible.”

Prefix definition

Prefixes usually change the word's meaning to the opposite, make it negative or positive, or express relations of time, place or manner. Prefixes follow rules. Usually, they change the root word's meaning to follow their rule (the root word is the base word with no prefix or suffix).

Adding prefixes to the base, or root, of existing words to form new words is common in English. The prefix is added in front of the base word (pre- means before) to create a new word with a different meaning. For example, if you add the prefix dis- to the word like, you get dislike—the opposite of like.

1. : an affix attached to the beginning of a word, base, or phrase and serving to produce a derivative word or an inflectional form compare suffix. 2. : a title used before a person's name.

Prefixes are letters that are added to the beginning of words to alter their meanings. Prefixes such as un-, poly-, im-, inter-, in- , and over- are among the most commonly used prefixes in the English language.

Overview. The common prefix between the two most dissimilar strings is the longest common prefix for an array of strings. For instance, there is no common prefix in the array apple, ape, and zebra since the two most distinct strings in the array, "ape" and "zebra," do not share any initial letters.

A suffix is a word part added to the end of a word (for example, -ful). If you add the suffix -ful to the base word, help, the word is helpful. A prefix is a word part added to the beginning of a word or base word (for example, un-).

Spelling Rules for Prefix Words

The following are some common rules. Rule 1: When placing the prefix at the start of the word, the root word spelling never changes. Just add the prefix to the beginning of the root word. This will form a new word from the two parts, the prefix and the root word.

The most common prefixes are a-, be-, de-, dis-, ex-, in-, mis-, non-, over-, pre-, re-, uni- and with-.

What is a prefix in a name example? ›

In addition to the first, middle, and last names, a name prefix and suffix may also be stored. Name prefixes are typically Dr., Mr., Mrs., Ms., and a name suffix may be Jr., Sr., to name a few.

Today we will focus on the prefix con-, which can mean “with” or “thoroughly.” Prefixes are morphemes which begin words, attaching to a word's main part, or stem. One highly used meaning of the prefix con- is “with.” For instance, when you connect two objects, you link them “with” each other.

We also use prefix to describe the title you put before someone's name. For example, Mr., Mrs., and Dr. are all common prefixes. Finally, we sometimes use prefix to refer to telephone numbers. In this context, prefix refers to the first set of digits after the country and area codes.