Overview
- The 12th edition arrives on November 18, with preorders available now.
- More than 5,000 additions span technology and culture, including "petrichor," "teraflop," "dumbphone," "ghost kitchen," "rizz" and "dad bod."
- Editors removed sparse biographical and geographical sections, trimmed archaic terms, and added over 20,000 usage examples along with enhanced entries for top lookups.
- The print release comes as dictionary sales have declined 9% over the past year, while Merriam-Webster reports about 1 billion annual website visits and roughly 500% revenue growth over a decade from digital products.
- The book retains lettered thumb notches for browsing, now produced in India after the last U.S. printer capable of making them closed.