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What is the correct form? Does context play a role?

Are there noticeable trends towards the awkward "noone" or is it just a by-product of careless orthography on the Internet?

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No-one cares. Haha, sorry, I just had to. I obviously care since I came here looking for the answer. There are conflicting answers on several grammar sites though. Maybe I should call Sister Dorothy, my sixth grade english teacher :) –  user54602 Oct 21 '13 at 16:26

1 Answer 1

up vote 18 down vote accepted

"no one" is the correct one.

noone is the common misspelling of "no one".

"Noone" is formed for consistency with "nobody", and also its opposites "anyone" and "everyone", but it is still considered nonstandard because of the doubled vowels creating a temptation to read and pronounce it as "noon" (/nuːn/).

On the other hand, no-one is the alternative spelling of "no one". I don't think it's widely used.

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Correction: no-one is quite widely used within British English. noone is indeed wrong. –  Noldorin Jan 13 '11 at 23:25
I agree with @Noldorin. Though "no-one"is not particularly good-looking either, I don't use "no one", because it feels very much like one word, and because of slight confusion in sentences like "no one word could express this" (though perhaps you would use "single" in this example). Besides, I think "nobody" often replaces it at any rate. –  Cerberus Jan 14 '11 at 0:09
@Noldorin: Mostly in my experience, the British use no one. Though I have seen all three aplenty. –  Orbling Jan 14 '11 at 0:17
@Orbling: I see both quite a lot to be honest. Don't ask for statistics though. :) –  Noldorin Jan 14 '11 at 1:09
No love for noöne? –  Jon Purdy Jan 14 '11 at 8:14

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