Walkthrough, Walk through, or Walk-through?

“Walkthrough” is a complicated word that seems to have many forms. It might help to learn more about whether you should split it into one or two words or whether you should keep it hyphenated. So, this article will help you with that.

Walk through vs. Walk-through vs. Walkthrough

“Walk-through” is most commonly recognized with a hyphen. In most dictionaries, you will see that the two words are hyphenated. However, “walkthrough” is also a common spelling variation that people seem to use based on their stylistic choices, so it’s also grammatically correct.

According to Google Ngram Viewer, “walk through” appears to be the most common choice. However, this is due to a problem related to the phrase itself, and it is not a correct spelling variation when we look to define “walk-through.”

In The Cambridge Dictionary and the Oxford Dictionary, “walk-through” is the recognized spelling. Both dictionaries note that the hyphen is important whether it’s used as a noun or adjective.

However, both dictionaries also state that the alternative spelling “walkthrough” is correct. Neither dictionary uses “walk through” as a correct term, so why is it so popular on the graph?

These examples might help you to understand why the graph is skewed:

• You should walk through the gallery.
• Can we walk through the lanes together?

As you can see, “walk through” is a phrasal verb, which is irrelevant when we’re looking to define the one-word or hyphenated variations. Therefore, it’s not relevant to this article.

Is “Walkthrough” One Word?

“Walkthrough” is recognized as one word and is one of the best forms you can use when writing about it. It is clearly defined when written as one word, and it also happens to be the most popular spelling choice when you’re looking for walkthrough guides online.

There’s a simple way you can find out how popular “walkthrough” is as a spelling. If you just look for a guide on something (like a video game or computer program), you’ll find that most people like to spell it as one word whenever they can.

The following examples might help you with it:

1. I’ve created a walkthrough series that will help you understand more about it.
2. You need to watch the walkthrough before you can understand how to do those things.
3. What is the point in learning from a walkthrough? You get all the secrets!
4. I don’t think your walkthrough is correct, and it definitely doesn’t help me!

Is “Walk through” Two Words?

“Walk through” as two words is a strange one. It’s correct as a phrasal verb, but that’s not how we want to define it in this article. It is not correct when we’re looking at it as a noun, so you should avoid using it when you’re talking about instructions of some kind.

If “walk through” was going to be a correct adjective, it would need to be hyphenated. AP Stylebook guidelines teach us that if more than one word modifies a noun, it must be hyphenated. Therefore, “walk through” can never be correct in this context.

Here are a few examples to clear things up:

• Correct: I would like to watch a walkthrough about this.
• Incorrect: You should check out my walk through video.
• Correct: Where is the walk-through guide?
• Incorrect: I need to see a walk through before I get this!

Is “Walk-through” Hyphenated?

“Walk-through” is correct as both a noun and an adjective. We can use it in its hyphenated form in the same way that we can use it as a one-word option (“walkthrough”). The choice is yours, as it depends on your stylistic choice above all else.

Here are a few examples of how it looks:

1. Have you got any recommendations for a walk-through channel on this video site?
2. I need to see a walk-through about this.
3. My walk-through gallery is getting a lot of foot traffic.
4. Let’s go and find out more from this walk-through.

Is “Through” Capitalized In The Word “Walk-Through”?

There is no need to capitalize “through” in “walk-through” because it is not a proper noun. However, it might be a good idea to capitalize both parts of the word if you are writing it in a title and you choose to capitalize every other word present in the title.