Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for October 10, 2026 is:





Luddite • \LUH-dyte\ • noun

Luddite refers to someone who is opposed to change, and especially to technological change.

// My friends call me a Luddite for refusing to use chat bots.

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Examples:

“Today, a Luddite is your grandparent who keeps looking at the screen rather than the camera when on Zoom, the Boomer who types in all-capital letters, the grouchy man who refuses to get a smart phone, the professor spewing invective against Twitter, Facebook, and TikTok. … But the Luddites weren’t simple-minded primitives who objected to technology out of ignorance; they were dedicated craftsmen in the looming guilds who despised the shoddy craftsmanship of the mechanized contraptions replacing them, and of those same machines robbing them of their livelihoods.” — Ed Simon, Writing During the Apocalypse: Reflections on the Great Unraveling, 2026





Did you know?

Long before your Luddite friend was waxing poetic about how blissful it is to not have a smartphone, Luddites were protesting the textile machinery that was gradually replacing them. It was toward the end of 1811, in the vicinity of Nottingham, England, when handicraftsmen formed organized bands and began to riot for the destruction of the new machinery. Their name is of uncertain origin, but it may be connected to a (probably mythical) person named Ned Ludd. According to an unsubstantiated account in George Pellew's Life of Lord Sidmouth (1847), Ned Ludd was a Leicestershire villager of the late 1700s who, in a fit of rage, rushed into a stocking weaver's house and destroyed his equipment; subsequently, Ludd's name was proverbially connected with machinery destruction. With the onset of the information age, Luddite gained a broader sense describing anyone who shuns new technology.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for October 9, 2026 is:





inscrutable • \in-SKROO-tuh-bul\ • adjective

Inscrutable means "not readily investigated, interpreted, or understood." It often describes things that are mysterious or difficult to comprehend.

// His professor wore an inscrutable expression throughout the oral exam.

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Examples:

"The paper makes significant progress on an unresolved aspect of the inscrutable math equation that determines how the primes are distributed along the number line." — Joseph Howlett, Scientific American, 12 Aug. 2026





Did you know?

Scrutinizing the inscrutable may be futile: even close scrutiny can fail to decipher it. Scrutinizing the scrutable, on the other hand, is likely to yield some understanding. All of these scrut- words have the same Latin root: scrutari, meaning "to search or examine." While scrutiny, scrutinize, and inscrutable all prove themselves useful in everyday discourse, English speakers don’t tend to call much on scrutable, which functions as a synonym of comprehensible.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for October 8, 2026 is:





etiquette • \ET-ih-kut\ • noun

Etiquette refers to rules or customs that dictate what behavior is considered appropriate and expected in a particular setting.

// Her failure to respond to the invitation was a serious breach of etiquette.

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Examples:

“My first interaction with The Real Housewives franchise happened sometime in 2015, when my partner became hooked on the show. I had just begun work on what I expected to be a big and research-heavy multi-generational family novel, and all I could hear was a chorus of accusations about who said what to whom, who lied to whom, and who hadn’t followed the correct etiquette at a charity event.” — Saleen Haddad, Literary Hub, 24 Feb. 2026





Did you know?

If you’re looking for a polite topic of conversation to raise at your next gathering of word lovers, we’ve got just the ticket. The French word étiquette means “ticket”; its direct French ancestor also referred to a label attached to something for description or identification. Spaniards of the 16th-century adopted the French word (altering it to etiqueta), and used it to refer to the written protocols describing the behavior demanded of those who appeared at court. Eventually, etiqueta came to be applied to the court ceremonies themselves as well as to the documents which outlined their requirements. Word of this linguistic development got back to the French, who then expanded their word’s meaning to include “proper court behavior” along with its “label” sense. By the middle of the 18th century English speakers had taken on etiquette as their own, applying it to the rules that indicate the proper and polite way to behave, whether in the presence of royalty or not.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for October 7, 2026 is:





discreet • \dih-SKREET\ • adjective

Discreet describes someone who is careful about not allowing something to be known or noticed by many people. It can also describe something that is not likely to be seen or noticed by many people.

// She was always very discreet about her personal life.

// A photographer followed the singer at a discreet distance.

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Examples:

“Expectations surrounding their nuptials were high. But the couple opted for a discreet ceremony that took place in Cascais, Portugal, in complete privacy.” — Ahad Sanwari, Hello Magazine, 13 Aug. 2026





Did you know?

If you’ve ever mixed up discreet and discrete, you’re not alone. Which to use when writing is tricky to discern, given their identical pronunciation and shared etymology; both terms (and their relatives discern and certain) ultimately trace back to the Latin verb cernere, meaning “to sift, discern, decide, determine.” Yet despite these similarities, the words have separate—one might even say discrete—meanings. Something or someone described as discreet, with double e's, is unlikely to be known, seen, or noticed by many people (as in “found a discreet way to handle the problem”). Discrete, with its separate e's, describes things that are separate and different from each other (as in “a process broken down into a number of discrete steps”). A handy mnemonic for remembering which is which can be found in those e's: the t in discrete separates the two e’s.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for October 6, 2026 is:





regimen • \REJ-uh-mun\ • noun

Regimen refers to a plan or set of rules about food, exercise, etc., designed to make someone become or stay healthy.

// Sherry’s personal trainer started her on a workout regimen of 30 minutes on the treadmill followed by 30 minutes of weight training.

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Examples:

"The last step in a great antiaging skin care regimen is, of course, sunscreen." — Alanna Martine Kilkeary, Glamour, 27 Apr. 2026





Did you know?

Being but humble lexicographers, we cannot say whether an apple a day truly keeps the doctor away, but as far as regimens go, one could do a lot worse than snackin' on a McIntosh. Regimen, which usually refers to a system of rules or guidelines—often for living a healthy life or taking a regular dose of exercise—comes ultimately from a Latin verb, regere, meaning "to direct." Regere led in apple-pie order to the English word regimen, first by way of the Latin noun regimen, meaning "steering" or "control," and then via the Medieval Latin regimen, referring to a set of rules. Other regere descendants fell further from the tree, including correct, erect, region, rule, and surge. Be sure not to confuse regimen with regiment, which refers to a military unit, as doing so could upset the apple cart.