Spelling: Words with “ei” and “ie”

On this page

• The basic rule for spelling words with “ei” and “ie”
• Exceptions to the basic rule
  • Group 1: Words with “ei” after a letter other than “c”
  • Group 2: Words with “ie” after “c”
• Additional information

The basic rule for spelling words with “ei” and “ie”

The well-known “rule” learned by generations of schoolchildren is stated in the jingle “i before e except after c.”

Now, it’s true that putting i before e will give us the correct spelling for many words: belief, believe, chief, field, piece, thief, yield, etc. And remembering to reverse those letters after c will help us spell several other words correctly: ceiling, conceit, conceive, deceit, deceive, perceive, receipt, receive.

But this rule works only when the vowel combination makes the sound “ee”; and even then, it’s not accurate all of the time! As a result, it’s important to be aware of the many exceptions to this guideline.

Exceptions to the basic rule

The examples listed below show some of the most common exceptions to the basic guideline “i before e except after c.” (Note that the lists don’t contain all possible examples.)

Group 1: Words with “ei” after a letter other than “c”

There are several categories of words in which the vowel combination ei follows a letter other than c, as indicated below.

Words with “ei” pronounced as “ee”

• caffeine
• protein
• seize
• weird

Words with “ei” pronounced as “ay”

• eight, eighteen, eighty
• freight
• neighbour
• reign
• sleigh
• vein
• weigh, weight

Words with “ei” pronounced as “eye”

• either, neither
• feisty
• height
• heist
• sleight
• stein

Words with “ei” pronounced as short “e”

• heifer
• heir
• leisure
• their

Words with “ei” pronounced as “ǝ”

• foreign
• forfeit
• sovereign

Present participles of some verbs ending in “-e”

• agreeing, fleeing, seeing, etc.
• being
• bingeing, singeing, etc.
• canoeing, hoeing, snowshoeing, tiptoeing, etc.
• dyeing, eyeing

Group 2: Words with “ie” after “c”

There are a few categories of words in which the letter c may be followed by the vowel combination ie, as indicated below.

Words with the letter “c” pronounced as “sh”

• ancient
• conscience, conscientious
• deficiency, deficient; efficiency, efficient; etc.
• glacier
• species

Words with the letters “ci” pronounced as “sigh”

• science, scientific, scientist
• society, societal

Plural, comparative and superlative forms of words ending in “-cy”

• fancies; fancier, fanciest
• icier, iciest
• juicier, juiciest
• mercies

As the above examples show, the words that follow the basic rule are far outnumbered by the exceptions. Therefore, when you’re in doubt about whether to write ei or ie, we recommend relying on a good dictionary rather than on that hallowed spelling rule!

Additional information

Blog posts

• “I” before “e” except after “c” … or maybe not

Quizzes

• “I” before “e” except after “c”: Maybe, maybe not!