Frontend, Front end, or Front-end? (Helpful Examples)

Before talking about the “front end” of a system, it’s going to be useful to know how to spell it. We’ll teach you whether it’s one or two words and if the hyphenated form is something that you need to understand.

Front end vs. Front-end vs. Frontend

“Front end” works best when we are using it as a noun. In this form, we can use “front” to modify “end.” If we turn it into an adjective, we should make sure to hyphenate the phrase, meaning that “front-end” is also correct. “Frontend” is never written as one word.

According to Google Ngram Viewer, “front end” is more common, but there are still plenty of cases where “front-end” is correct as a hyphen form. This shows they are both likely to work in your writing.

The Cambridge Dictionary and The Oxford Dictionary both have entries alluding to “front end” as a noun. They both show that it should be written as two words in almost all cases.

However, they also both state that “front-end” is acceptable as an adjective. The examples they provide make it much clearer what this means.

Here are some examples to help you understand what it means too:

• Adjective: I’m a front-end developer.
• Noun: Let’s work through the front end first.

Is “Frontend” One Word?

“Frontend” is not correct when it’s grouped into one word. We must keep the hyphen present to show that there’s a clear difference between the words “front” and “end.” Sometimes, it’s okay to drop a hyphen like this, but this is not one of those cases.

Here are some examples of how you can make it work:

• Correct: Are you a front-end developer? Do you think you could help me figure this out?
• Incorrect: As someone who needs a frontend developer qualification before working here, I’ll still do my best to help you out.
• Correct: You’re not going to figure out the front end by just staring at it.
• Incorrect: Let’s not look into the frontend just yet. I think there’s more that we need to discuss first.

Is “Front end” Two Words?

“Front end” is correct as a noun. We can use the two words without connecting them to show that it’s correct as a standalone phrasal noun. “Front” is used to modify “end,” which shows the order of how a system should work (or how you can work on it).

Here are a couple of examples that should clue you in a bit more:

1. You’re not going to be able to get the front end sorted in time, are you?
2. I’d like to see what he can do on the front end. I’ve heard he’s got remarkable skills, but I’ll need to test them.
3. You’ll be working with her on the front end. I expect you to finish the task in record time.
4. Let’s just discuss how to use the front end first. We’ll figure out the rest later.

Is “Front-end” Hyphenated?

“Front-end” is hyphenated when we use it as an adjective. This form is used to modify another noun (i.e. “front-end developer”). The noun must always come straight after the adjective form when we hyphenate it in this way to aid the reader’s understanding.

AP Stylebook guidelines allow us to hyphenate more than one word when those words modify a common noun. Since “front” and “end” are both used to modify a specific noun, it makes sense that we would hyphenate them to demonstrate this.

Here are some examples that should help you understand what we mean about it:

1. I’m going to need a few front-end developers to sort this out for me. Do you know any?
2. We have a front-end developer coming in to help us out. I think it would be worth listening to him.
3. You’re not the front-end web developer that we came to look for. Though, you’ll probably still do just fine.
4. He’s working with the front-end system, so you’ll need to wait for a little while to see what he makes of it.

Is “End” Capitalized In The Word “Front-End”?

Finally, let’s quickly go over how to capitalize hyphenated forms. Some people struggle with this, so we want to make sure we figure it out right away.

“End” does not need to be capitalized in “front-end.” If we start a sentence with it, only “front” is capitalized as the hyphen treats the two words as one. However, in a title, you might find it more useful to write it as “Front-End” to fit in better.

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