Accept or Except? How to Use Them the Right Way

Confounding words like this (e.g., new vs. knew, effect vs. affect, pain vs. pane) are so common that they even have a name. They’re called homophones and they can be downright frustrating—leading to confusion, grammatical errors, and more. So, where to begin?

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For now, we’ll just tackle accept vs. except and give you some food for thought, so you can quickly figure out which version to use. Let’s start with some easy tricks:

Is there an action? Accept is a verb. If you’re going to accept an object or idea, you’re committing an act of some kind. The act of accepting is receiving (e.g., accept food, accept advice, or accept an apology.) It can also mean understanding something (e.g., accept the facts, accept the explanation, or accept the truth.)

HINT: You can connect the two by remembering that you’re acting by accepting, and both start with the letter “A.”

Is there exclusion? If you’re making an exception for something, you’re excluding it from the rest of a group or list (e.g., “I bought everything on my shopping list except lettuce.” or “I invited everyone to the party except Mona.”) You left certain things or people out—so they’re the exception. Think of it as excluding your “ex” boyfriend or “ex” girlfriend if it helps you remember (e.g., “I want everyone there except my ex!)

HINT: You can connect the two by remembering if something’s excluded, it’s an exception, and both start with the letter “E.”

Is it a conjunction? In addition to using except to exclude something, it can also be used as a conjunction (to join two opposing sentences). For example, “I was planning to go to the zoo, except it rained, so I stayed home instead.” In this instance, except is used to change the direction of the sentence.

Is it excepted or accepted? This one’s pretty easy. If you’re trying to figure out if something has been excepted or accepted— it’s most likely accepted (e.g., “The school accepted my doctor’s written excuse for missing class.”) While excepted is a word that denotes being excluded, it’s not often used in everyday speech (e.g., “I excepted him from my invitation.”)

Think about the context in which you’re using these two words in your writing. Hopefully, these simple tricks will make it a lot easier to figure out how to correctly use except vs. accept down the road.