“Colorless” or “Colourless”—What's the difference?

Usage by country

Where each spelling is used

Of the 12 countries below, 3 prefer “colorless” and 7 prefer “colourless”. Usage levels are out of 100; the more common spelling in each country is in bold.

Usage level out of 100 (if available).
Country	colorless	colourless	Preference
United States	98	2	“colorless”
United Kingdom	14	86	“colourless”
India	18	82	“colourless”
Philippines	96	4	“colorless”
Canada	58	42	“colorless”
Australia	20	80	“colourless”
Liberia	0	0	Not enough data
Ireland	18	82	“colourless”
New Zealand	28	72	“colourless”
Jamaica	0	100	“colourless”
Trinidad & Tobago	0	100	“colourless”
Guyana	0	0	Not enough data

Usage

Examples in context

Real sentences for each spelling. Hover an example to copy it.

“colorless”

This colorless solid is an important isomer…
…because it is non-flammable and colorless and dissolves readily in blood.
It is characterized by colorless growth with lavender colored aerial…
…ventral and anal fins are colorless.
…laid eggs are spherical, nearly colorless, having chorionic threads; live eggs…
Pure adamite is colorless, but usually it possess yellow…
It is a colorless oily liquid that is an…
…connected to a tuft of colorless, long, slender (2.5–5 µm diameter)
…complained: "These melodies are flabby, colorless – there is nothing that…
…is added to the otherwise colorless and almost odorless hydrogen gas,…

“colourless”

This colourless salt has a taste similar…
…smaller boron hydrides, pentaborane is colourless, diamagnetic, and volatile.
Colourless or purple impressed duty stamps…
It is a colourless solid that is used industrially…
…base is encased in a colourless sheath.
It is a colourless gas that reacts with oxygen…
…at nodes where there are colourless leaf-like cataphylls.
This colourless oil is commonly abbreviated "diars."
…Out of the brown leaf-brown colourless / Bring the imperceptible cool."
…Chronical, described as, "This rather colourless newspaper was the first attempt…

Examples are Wikipedia snippets under the CC ShareAlike 3.0 license.

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