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We add -ing to a verb to form its present participle, and -ed to regular verbs to form the past simple. When doing this, we sometimes double the last letter of the verb, as in these examples:

stop ⇒ sto pp ed, sto pp ing stoped stoping

ed, sto ing refer ⇒ referred, referring refered refering

Sometimes, however, we don’t double the last letter, as with the verb visit:

visit ⇒ visited, visiting visitted visitting

To understand this spelling rule, it’s first necessary to know the meaning of vowel and consonant:

vowels = a e i o u

consonants are all other letters (b c d f g, etc).



The rule

When to double a consonant before adding -ed and -ing to a verb We double the final letter when a one-syllable verb ends in consonant + vowel + consonant.* stop, rob, sit stopping, stopped, robbing, robbed, sitting We double the final letter when a word has more than one syllable, and when the final syllable is stressed in speech. beGIN, preFER beginning, preferring, preferred If the final syllable is not stressed, we do not double the final letter. LISten, HAPpen listening, listened, happening, happened

In British English,andare exceptions to this rule:travel, traveing, traveed; cancel, canceing, canceed.* We dodouble the final letter when a word ends in two consonants (-rt, -rn, etc.):sta– staring, stared; bu- bur, bured.* We dodouble the final letter whenvowels come directly before it:remn – remaiing, remaied.* We dodoubleorat the end of words:pla– plaing, plaed; sno- snoing, snoed.

See also:

Spelling: when to double a consonant before adding -er or -est to an adjective >>