Confusables Entry 50 / 1011 60-second read

Apportion vs. Proportion

Assigning shares versus a relative part of a whole.

The comparisoni

✗ Wrong

We need to proportion the resources across the team.

✓ Correct

We need to apportion the resources across the team.

More examplesii

01

The liability was proportioned among the partners.

The liability was apportioned among the partners.

02

The apportion of failures was high.

The proportion of failures was high.

The ruleiii

APPORTION = to divide and assign (action).

Both deal with 'parts' of a 'whole', but one is the act of giving and the other is the size of the piece.

Memory aidiv

Remember it like this

APPORTION is a verb (action). PROPORTION is a noun (position/size).

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