“Legitimize” or “Legitimise”—What's the difference?

Usage by country

Where each spelling is used

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

Usage level out of 100 (if available).
Country	legitimize	legitimise	Preference
United States	98	2	“legitimize”
United Kingdom	29	71	“legitimise”
India	50	50	No clear preference
Philippines	100	0	“legitimize”
Canada	100	0	“legitimize”
Australia	27	73	“legitimise”
Liberia	0	0	Not enough data
Ireland	0	100	“legitimise”
New Zealand	0	0	Not enough data
Jamaica	0	0	Not enough data
Trinidad & Tobago	0	0	Not enough data
Guyana	0	0	Not enough data

Usage

Examples in context

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

“legitimize”

…the war years (partly to legitimize his government's decision to join…
…Buddha to the region and legitimize both the Buddha relic and…
…to wreak their vengeance, he'll legitimize what's going to happen.
…making demands, Occupy refused to legitimize the existing political structure of…
…communist propaganda to attempt to legitimize their rule.
Tinoco sought to legitimize his regime by creating a…
…champions by the promoters to legitimize their version of the championship.
…induction is an opportunity to legitimize the Hall of Fame.
…Islamic representations to continue to legitimize the public space of Tatar.
…built the Assumption Cathedral to legitimize his claim that Vladimir had…

“legitimise”

October 3 In order to legitimise the rebellion inside and outside…
…with God in attempt to legitimise his new position as head…
…reference the declarative doctrine to legitimise their claims.
…if they used Hirohito to legitimise their changes."
…his earlier military career would legitimise the puppet regime.
…married Martha in 1880 to legitimise the two children.
…of Proletarian Nationalism, supposed to legitimise Italy's imperialism by a mixture…
…use of mass campaigns to legitimise the state and the policies…
Hence, he refused to legitimise the Parliament and he was…
…may be made to normalise, legitimise, rationalise, deny, or minimise the…

Examples are Wikipedia snippets under the CC ShareAlike 3.0 license.

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