Learn English – Are both “from the offset” and “from the outset” correct

grammaticalityphrases

I had always seen that phrase as "from the outset", but recently I saw somebody writing "from the offset" (meaning "from the beginning").

Dictionary.com claims that "offset" can be a synonym for "outset":

2) the start, beginning, or outset.

Would this mean that both of these phrases are correct? Do certain dialects prefer one over the other? US vs UK usage?

Best Answer

offset can mean the start of something when referring to distances in space:

  • competitors in short races on oval tracks start at offsets from the nominal starting line to account for the curvatures of their lanes
  • web page content might be rendered starting at a horizontal and vertical offset from the edge of the web browser, to allow room for ads
  • computer data is stored physically in computer memory starting at an offset from the begining of the available memory so as not to overwrite memory already in use by other programs

but not when referring to distances in time. And even when referring to space, from the offset is not a standard idiom in the English language (at least not in Google ngrams). It does not make sense without context.

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