Word.ws English Dictionary

endian

Syllables: end·i·an/ˈɛn.dɪ.ən/US/ˈɛn.di.ən/

endian adjective: preceded by a qualifying word: of a computer: storing multibyte numbers with the most significant byte at a particular memory address; for example, at the smallest address (big-endian) or the largest address (little-endian).

Adjective

endian (not comparable)

  1. Preceded by a qualifying word: of a computer: storing multibyte numbers with the most significant byte at a particular memory address; for example, at the smallest address (big-endian) or the largest address (little-endian).
    • endian-neutral code
    • In Ken Turkowski's article on the big and little endian addressing used on the 68020 he commented that Motorola's approach "proved" that a machine with consistant^([sic]) bit addressing (e.g., all little or big endian) was impossible. I assume that he was joking.1984 August 25, Ian Kaplan, “Inconsistent bit addressing in the 68020: big- AND little-endian”, in net.micro.68k (Usenet)

Origin of endian

From end + -ian (suffix meaning ‘one from, belonging to, like, or relating to’ forming nouns, and meaning ‘from, like, or related to’ forming adjectives), originally in the noun Big-Endian coined by the Anglo-Irish author Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) in his novel Gulliver’s Travels (1726). Swift wrote of an emperor of Lilliput who, after his son cuts his finger when opening an egg at the large end, commands his subjects to open them at the small end; those who rebel by opening their eggs at the large end are called “Big-Endians”. The term was applied in the computing context by the Israeli-American computer scientist Danny Cohen (1937–2019) in 1980.

Questions about endian

What does endian mean?
Endian means preceded by a qualifying word: of a computer: storing multibyte numbers with the most significant byte at a particular memory address; for example, at the smallest address (big-endian) or the largest address (little-endian).
What part of speech is endian?
Endian is an adjective.
How do you pronounce endian?
Endian is pronounced /ˈɛn.dɪ.ən/ (UK).

Words near endian in the dictionary

  1. endguts
  2. endiadem
  3. endiademed
  4. endiademing
  5. endiadems
  6. endian
  7. endianless
  8. endianness
  9. endiannesses
  10. endichnial
  11. endichnion

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: endian (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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