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Cite, Sight, and Site
As homophones—words that sound alike but are distinct— cite, sight, and site are easily confused, but they have different meanings, uses, and origins.
Cite is most often encountered in the sense of "to name in a citation"—that is, a line or short section taken from a piece of writing or a speech; it may also mean "to mention as an example" or "to order to appear in a court of law." Cite is from the Latin citare, "to rouse, call on, summon," source too of citation and recite.
Most of the senses of sight are concerned with seeing. A wonderful spectacle might be described as a sight, as might the general capacity to see anything ("my sight is not as good as it once was"). Sight is also used in a number of fixed phrases, such as "out of sight, out of mind," "sight unseen," and "set one's sights on." Sight comes from Old English gesiht, meaning "the faculty or act of sight, thing seen."
Site is most often concerned with location; it is related to situate, "to locate," and situation, "relative position or combination of circumstances at a particular moment." A building site is the place where a building is, or will be, located. In contemporary English, site is frequently used as a shortened form of website, to refer to the location of a group of web pages. Site comes from Latin situs, meaning "place, position, site."
Associating citation with cite, eyesight with sight, and situate with site may be helpful in applying these correctly.
Examples of site in a Sentence
Maura Fox, San Diego Union-Tribune, 25 Nov. 2025
Serious events, such as allergic reactions or injection-site cancers in cats, occur in one in 10,000 to 30,000 cases — far rarer than the deadly diseases vaccines prevent.
—Henry I. Miller, Boston Herald, 25 Nov. 2025
Last week, the club threatened to look for a stadium site outside the city after the council delayed votes on an initial $50 million allocation to the project at Broadway and I-25.
—Kyle Newman, Denver Post, 25 Nov. 2025
Business columnist Jonathan Lansner wrote in June that Costco intends to demolish the movie theater, replacing it with a 160,811 square-foot warehouse store on the 16-acre site.
—Samantha Gowen, Oc Register, 24 Nov. 2025
See All Example Sentences for site
Cite this Entry
“Site.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/site. Accessed 27 Nov. 2025.
Copy CitationMedical Definition
site
noun
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