Traveling or Travelling: Double L Spelling Rule
You’ve learned we double up the last consonant of some words that end in one vowel + one consonant when we add some suffixes (-ed; -ing; en; est; er; ish; y; ery).
One of the rules is to double up the words that have one syllable sound like big-biggest; run-running; hot-hotter.
But we also double up some words that end in one vowel + one consonant that have more than one syllable and the last one is stressed (begin-beginning; commit-commited).
However, a lot of English learners don’t understand why the verb ‘travel’ is sometimes written with one ‘L’ and other times with double ‘L’.
American English: Traveling. In American English we spell ‘traveling’, with one ‘L’. You just have to follow the rule. The word ‘travel’ ends in one vowel + one consonant, but the last one is not stressed, so, we don’t double the ‘L’.
British English: Travelling. In British English we spell travelling, with double ‘L’ because words ending in one vowel + ‘L’, to add some suffixes, we double the ‘L’. Check some examples:
British English: travel – travelled; model – modelling; cancel – cancellation; initial – initialled.
American English: travel – traveled; model – modeling; cancel – cancelation; initial – initialed.
Pay attention: There are exceptions, so when you have doubts, check the dictionary or a Grammar book.