Other forms: practices, practiced, practicing
Practice is doing a thing over and over until it stops being hard, and to practise is to do it. Twenty minutes of scales before dinner; the same three-point turn round the same empty car park.
The spelling is the trap. British English splits the pair — practice is the noun, practise is the verb, exactly as advice and advise split — while American English spells both practice. If the rule slips away from you, remember that ice is a thing, and a practice is a thing. The word also names a professional business: a doctor's practice, a law practice, a dentist who practises in Leeds. And practice means the customary way something is done, which is where standard practice, good practice, and in theory it works, in practice it does not all come from. Practice makes perfect, and anyone who stops is out of practice.
1verbpracticeTo do something again and again in order to get better at it.~2%
“She practises the piano for an hour before school.”
2nounrepeatedRepeated doing of something in order to get better at it.~2%
“It takes practice to reverse a trailer without hitting anything.”
3nounusualThe usual or customary way something is done.~38%
“It is standard practice to check the reading twice.”
4nounbusinessThe business of a doctor, lawyer, or dentist.~50%
“He runs a small practice above the chemist.”
5verbworkTo work in a profession such as medicine or law.~8%
“She practises law in Leeds and lives in York.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 23 sentences found in the wild and placed 23 of them on a sense — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
Also accepted in games: practise
Practice arrived as a verb first: Middle French pratiser, an alteration of practiquer, from Medieval Latin prācticāre, from Latin prācticus, from Ancient Greek πρακτικός. The noun was then made from the verb, and in Middle English both were spelled practice. Later the noun was pulled towards the -ice ending of other nouns, and the split people still argue about was born. It displaced the native Old English word sidu.
Proto-Indo-European
*per- (fare)
Middle French
pratiser
an unknown language
practice
Middle English
practice
English, today
practice
From Middle English practice, from an unknown language practice, from Middle French pratiser. The noun is from Middle English practice, practique, practyse, from the verb; also compare Medieval Latin prāctica.. Displaced native Old English sidu. The verb is from Middle English practice, practise, practize, practyse, from Middle French pratiser, practiser, alteration of practiquer, from Medieval Latin prācticāre, from Latin prācticus, from Ancient Greek πρακτικός.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA