What do bimonthly and biweekly mean?: Usage Guide
Many people are puzzled about bimonthly and biweekly, which are often ambiguous because they are formed from two different senses of bi-: "occurring every two" and "occurring two times." This ambiguity has been in existence for nearly a century and a half and cannot be eliminated by the dictionary. The chief difficulty is that many users of these words assume that others know exactly what they mean, and they do not bother to make their context clear. So if you need bimonthly or biweekly, you should leave some clues in your context to the sense of bi- you mean. And if you need the meaning "twice a," you can substitute semi- for bi-. Biannual and biennial are usually differentiated.
Examples of biweekly in a Sentence
Stephen R. Mettling et al., Modern Residential Financing Methods, 1990
Last week ABC brought back Dick Cavett … and introduced syndicated newspaper columnist Jimmy Breslin as Cavett's biweekly alternate (Thursday and Fridays).
—Harry Waters, Newsweek, 6 Oct. 1986
She attends biweekly classes and studies at the library every Saturday.
Andy Dunn, Fortune, 23 May 2024
Nobody asked me, but there are two major benefits to the return to weekly recycling in the city (versus the biweekly schedule Baltimore had kept since the pandemic).
—Dan Rodricks, Baltimore Sun, 8 Mar. 2024
See all Example Sentences for biweekly 
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'biweekly.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Dictionary Entries Near biweekly
Cite this Entry
“Biweekly.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/biweekly. Accessed 3 Jun. 2024.
Copy CitationKids Definition
biweekly
1 of 2 adjective
biweekly
2 of 2 noun
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