Know the Difference Between Rise and Raise

Think you're sure about when to use raise and rise in a conversation or your written work? Even native English speakers get these two mixed up on occasion, so it can be helpful to do a quick refresher.

Steps

  1. Understand the difference in meanings. The meanings of "rise" and "raise" differ slightly and therefore need to be applied in different ways. For example, very basically the meanings can be said to be as follows:
    • Rise refers to something being moved upwards or an amount of something being increased. For example, to say that the sun rises and hot air rises refers to the action of these objects moving upwards.
    • Raise refers to something being moved to a higher position or something getting improved. For example, to say that you raise your hand or your voice refers to the action of moving your hand or voice to a higher level than previously. Or, you might refer to a need to raise efficiency in the factory, when factory efficiency needs to improve.
  2. Be aware of the regular or irregular status of each verb. "Raise" is a regular verb. This makes it easy to remember in both the past and perfect participles. On the other hand, "rise" is an irregular verb and its past and perfect participles therefore changes in its past participle and perfect participle forms.
    • Raise:
      • Past participle : Raised.
      • Perfect participle : Raised.
    • Rise:
      • Past participle : Rose.
      • Perfect participle : Risen.
  3. Keep in mind that raise is a transitive verb. This means that it always needs an object to act on, such as "I raised the object into the air". On the other hand, rise is intransitive; that is, it does not need an object and only ever involves the subject. It can help to remember that intransitive verbs denote something that you do "to yourself", such as "I rise at dawn", whereas if it's your arms being raised at dawn, your arms become objects rather than your whole self. More examples:
    • Raise (raise, raised, raised, is raising):
      • I raised my head to look at them.
      • She raises the book from the floor.
    • Rise (rise, rose, risen, is rising):
      • My head rose upon hearing the harsh noises.
      • My book is rising to the bestsellers top ten list.
    • It might help you to remember this mnemonic: To rAise grammatically has an Attack to or an Action on an object, but to rise does not have.
  4. Use the verbs within the appropriate context. There are some fairly standard usages of both verbs, depending on the context. For example:
    • "I rise each day at 8 o'clock" - this is a formal way of saying "I get up each day at 8 o'clock".
    • "She rose when the queen entered the room" - another formal way of saying "she got up when the queen entered the room".
    • "The wind and water level are rising, please evacuate!" - this refers to the wind becoming stronger and the water level moving upwards.
    • "He wanted to rise to the top of his field" - is one way of saying "He wanted to be promoted to the top of his field".
    • "Use of disposable water bottles rose during the 90s" - is another way of saying "Use of disposable water bottles increased during the 90s".
    • "Those of you wishing to visit the museum today, please raise your hand." - refers to "putting up or lifting" your hand.
    • "I have to raise my voice because he's a little deaf." - refers to "lifting the level" of the person's voice.
    • "She raised the hem slightly to make the skirt shorter." - refers to placing the hem in a higher position than before.
    • Learn various relevant idioms, such as "to raise the alarm", "to raise the roof", "to not raise a finger", "to raise a smile", "to rise to the bait", "to get a rise from", "to rise to the occasion/challenge", and so forth. Each of these needs to be learned as unique phrases within their relevant context if you're learning English as a second language.
  5. Note a slight difference between the application of raise and rise in British and American English. In some cases, the usage of raise and rise is switched around depending on which form of English you're using. A good example is to do with salary. In British English, you receive a "pay rise", while in American English, you receive a "pay raise". Both are correct and you are likely to be understood whichever you refer to.
  6. Contrast the more abstractly applied verb "arise". Arise can mean "to get up", "to emerge from a source" or "to come into being/come to one's attention". It's used widely too and should be used in a similar fashion to "rise".
    • The past participle is "arose", the perfect participle is "arisen".
    • It's often used to express abstract notions or uncertainty. For example:
      • "If the possibility arose, I'd definitely go to Paris." - You're not sure if the chance to go to Paris will happen.
      • "I'd like to return this iPhone––a problem has arisen with its ability to receive calls." - You know the outcome of the problem but not necessarily what's causing it.
    • To see the difference between "raise" and "arise", see this example:
      • "Immediately I raised the question as to the witness's credibility." (you have to use transitive verb raise).
      • "The question arises whether the witness is credible." (intransitive verb arise is used).

Tips

  • Consider other pairs such as intransitive to fall versus transitive to drop that bear the same meaning but with no confusion in spelling.
  • To improve your awareness of the complete range of meanings (semantics) of the words rise, raise and arise, refer to a quality dictionary for a variety of explanations and a breadth of examples.
  • Arise is actually a rise arise means to awaken and raise means that you take something up like  I raised the sail and if ever to be seen is the same as to raise.

Things You'll Need

  • Quality dictionary

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