alt.hn

2/12/2026 at 8:27:27 PM

What's the difference between a "disc" and a "disk"? (2023)

 https://support.apple.com/en-gb/100749

by IndySun

2/12/2026 at 9:33:01 PM

> In most varieties of English, disk is the preferred spelling for magnetic media (hence floppy disk, hard disk, disk drive), whereas disc is preferred for optical media (hence compact disc, digital versatile disc, optical disc).

> For all other uses, disk is preferred in American English and acceptable in Canadian English, and disc otherwise.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/disk#Usage_notes

by bmacho

2/13/2026 at 2:36:13 AM

It's all photons baby, sometimes virtual.

by karmakaze

2/13/2026 at 8:56:59 AM

> In most varieties of English, disk is the preferred spelling for magnetic media (hence floppy disk, hard disk, disk drive), whereas disc is preferred for optical media (hence compact disc, digital versatile disc, optical disc).

that's exactly my understanding as a non-native English speaker who haven't even read the article :-)

in my native language, they both share same word - disk (hard disk, compact disk), though floppy disk had it's own word

by Markoff

2/12/2026 at 9:49:33 PM

Also, disk is also used in "diskette", whereas disc stands alone. So as magnetic disks shrank and were called disketts on and off, they kept that spelling. Optical discs never really shrank over the years, never being called discettes.

by sandworm101

2/12/2026 at 9:57:10 PM

When they shrank the disc it just became minidisc ;-) But that was technically MO, not just optical. And: it was in a cartridge so I suppose they really should have called it minidisk.

by oneplane

2/12/2026 at 9:58:21 PM

[flagged]

by irishcoffee

2/12/2026 at 10:18:09 PM

Lol. Old enough to remember when disks were three-dimensional, when you might need more than one hand to carry them. When they shrank we regularly called the newer/small model a diskette.

From wikipedia: >> A floppy disk, diskette, or floppy diskette is a type of disk storage made from a thin, flexible disk coated with a magnetic storage medium. It is enclosed in a square or nearly square plastic shell lined with fabric to help remove dust from the spinning disk.

by sandworm101

2/12/2026 at 9:29:56 PM

The term "disc" for storage predates optical media. "Disc" was the common spelling for a disk (like a floppy disk) on British 8-bit computers like Amstrad CPC or Sinclair Spectrum.[1][2]

It seems like the distinction simply comes from British and American preferences.[3]

I have no idea how Apple jumped to such an arbitrary conclusion.

[1] Kempston Disc Interface manual: https://k1.spdns.de/Vintage/Sinclair/82/Peripherals/Disc%20I...

[2] Amstrad Disc Drive Interface manual: https://www.cpcwiki.eu/imgs/3/3f/DDI-1_User_Manual.pdf

[3] Etymonline entry for "disk": https://www.etymonline.com/word/disk

by sedatk

2/12/2026 at 9:32:37 PM

Disk was already the standard spelling in the UK by 1984 (in a computing context), just as program was used in preference to programme. But Amstrad mistyped it as disc on the plastic mouldings for their first CPC, and were too cheap to change them. Consequently CPC 3in disks were always called discs even into the 90s.

by Doctor_Fegg

2/12/2026 at 9:23:08 PM

This is goofy. The difference was originally regional (US/UK), and which caught on depended on which product dominated which sub-market. There's no semantic difference.

by MarkusQ

2/12/2026 at 9:30:33 PM

Philips is the company that came up with the term "Compact Disc" for CDs, so we can blame them for goofing up the regional spellings and making the world more confusing.

I think Alan Shugart (or at least his team at IBM) started calling portable data disks "floppy disks," and then "hard disk" emerged to differentiate rigid disks from bendy ones. Maybe we can also blame him and his team.

The important thing is that someone gets blamed. :D

by innocentoldguy

2/12/2026 at 9:13:08 PM

And where is the "drive" in an SSD?

Trying to explain arbitrary words with logic always fails.

by fainpul

2/12/2026 at 9:57:55 PM

Same as the Alcubierre drive! ;)

by actionfromafar

2/12/2026 at 8:57:37 PM

There was a subculture communicating on FIDOnet about collecting AOL installation media (3.5" disks) and reusing them. Somehow we ended up coining the term "bisk" to refer to AOL's given-away media, and much sadness was had when they moved to CDs.

So add one more to the list: a commercial disk reused for your custom .WAD files can be a bisk.

by coffee--

2/12/2026 at 9:31:33 PM

Tron, if I remember correctly, had DISCS instead of DISKS. And if modern CPUs are RISCy, then maybe modern Intel architecture CPUs are Risky.

by OhMeadhbh

2/12/2026 at 9:15:49 PM

The last letter.

[Did I pass the interview? No? Understandable.]

by bonesss

2/12/2026 at 11:30:23 PM

A disc jockey is an entertainer who spins records or compact discs to play music.

A discothèque is a nightclub where disc jockeys can perform live, spinning to create a party atmosphere for socializing and dancing.

In the United States, the word was quickly shortened to "disco" and became closely associated with the mirror ball on the ceiling and the eponymous style of music and dancing.

So when new styles of music overtook the nightclubs, they shed the "disco" appellation as well. It seems to still enjoy a lot of use in European cities, though.

by RupertSalt

2/12/2026 at 9:51:00 PM

Always thought that “disc” was the original word for an object of a certain shape. As they evolved for computer storage, we got smaller diskettes… which were abbreviated to disks.

by addaon

2/12/2026 at 9:09:53 PM

A disc looks like a disc, and a disk doesn't look like a disc.

by rikthevik

2/13/2026 at 2:27:05 AM

Removeable glass magnetic platters were called disk packs and definitely disc shaped (but sometimes cylindrical if it had many platters).

by karmakaze

2/12/2026 at 9:38:55 PM 

  sceptic - skeptic
  mollusc - mollusk
  celt - kelt
  cabob - kabob
  disc - disk
Corporate wants you to find the difference.

by delichon

2/12/2026 at 9:47:02 PM

sceptic - someone inclined to question or doubt what they sense optically.

skeptic - someone inclined to question or doubt what they sense magnetically.

by 9rx

2/12/2026 at 9:47:09 PM

As a quick and dirty heuristic: the C in disc is for CD (or other optical media).

by asdfman123

2/12/2026 at 9:14:03 PM

Apple, the etymology company.

by gaigalas

2/12/2026 at 9:32:19 PM

They certainly do have bugs.

[Edit. Sorry, misread your comment as saying "entomology."]

by OhMeadhbh

2/12/2026 at 8:51:13 PM

Disc = round part visible

Disk = round part hidden or no round part

Have I got it!?

by dTal

2/12/2026 at 9:00:35 PM

I think their primary difference is disc = optical, disk = magnetic. That’s what they mention first.

All of that “in the UK”.

Looking at the store, they’re using “SSD Storage” for SSD.

by Someone

2/12/2026 at 9:12:45 PM

The British spelling was used by Philips when they launched the Compact Disc with Sony.

Disk was used by American companies inventing hard disks, floppy disks etc.

British software often used "disc" for both, e.g. RISC OS on Acorn/ARM/Raspberry Pi [1].

[1] https://arcwiki.org.uk/index.php/RISC_OS_3 (see screenshot)

by Symbiote

2/12/2026 at 11:07:38 PM

Apple uses “disk” when referring to SSD storage. They still use disc when referring to a CD or DVD

Source: the language used in MacOS Tahoe

by kube-system

2/12/2026 at 9:43:06 PM

SSD could stand for "SSD Storage Device".

Bring back recursive acronyms!

by HPsquared

2/12/2026 at 9:17:44 PM

SSD, of course, stands for Solid State Dis[c,k]...

by Wowfunhappy

2/12/2026 at 10:49:22 PM

Disck.

by andrewshadura

2/12/2026 at 9:43:02 PM

Solid State Drive, usually, but when it comes to language anything goes.

by 9rx

2/13/2026 at 9:39:06 AM

A drive is a motor or other similar device, one that is driven or worked.

But there are no moving parts in an SSD.

by Symbiote

2/13/2026 at 1:44:11 PM

Hence solid state.

by 9rx

2/12/2026 at 9:26:37 PM

So a floppy disk has a disc inside?

by adamdonahue

2/12/2026 at 9:30:32 PM

No because they weren't optical, they were magnetic.

by KwanEsq

2/12/2026 at 9:39:13 PM

Yes it did. They were magnetic disks. And they were floppy. The outer case of a 3.5" was solid but just rip it open and you can see the disk itself is floppy.

Edit: oh right, you're talking about the different spellings. Those were entirely arbitrary. We mixed between the two.

by onraglanroad

2/12/2026 at 9:30:16 PM

Sure does.

by irishcoffee

2/13/2026 at 10:21:34 AM

δίσκος

by mieses

2/12/2026 at 9:24:12 PM

When I was much more active in Reddit did one time a meme for r/peloton of Froome yelling at disc brakes - but wrote it as "Old man yells at disk brakes".

Nobody told me anything so I guessed it was good grammar and such.

But then noticed everyone calls them "disc brakes"

by Gualdrapo

2/12/2026 at 11:45:56 PM

Should be "rotor brakes"

by ndsipa_pomu

2/12/2026 at 10:04:32 PM

A disk is any planar circular shape.

A disc is a disk-shaped object, such as in the form of a plastic dingus: Frisbee flying disc.

by _wire_

2/12/2026 at 10:02:46 PM

Presumably this apple page is someone's idea of an April fool, date notwithstanding.

"Disc" is the correct spelling of the flat circular thing.

"Disk" was invented by someone in the 1980s either as an attempt at a trade name, or because they couldn't spell.

Then other people continued the mis spelling.

by dboreham

2/12/2026 at 11:05:29 PM

This must be the right answer.

by jimnotgym

2/12/2026 at 10:00:43 PM

Does anyone have a spate tire? My tyre popped, probably because someone jammed a 'y' in the middle.

by irishcoffee

2/12/2026 at 9:21:15 PM

What about bloc vs block

by dheera

2/12/2026 at 8:59:08 PM

"Disks" as in floppy disks, are removable also. Some weird seperation choices in this 'article'.

by ChrisArchitect

2/12/2026 at 9:08:21 PM

Plus a common alternative to "hard drive" was "hard disk."

My late father never quite got out of the habit of calling it the "Winchester" - itself a nickname for a specific IBM drive model.

by dcminter

2/12/2026 at 9:43:18 PM

More modern hard disks included the drive mechanism in one unit.

They used to be separate, so you would mount the hard disk on the drive to make it accessible.

by onraglanroad

2/12/2026 at 10:12:59 PM

Yeah, we used to have a couple of the removable phoenix platters knocking around.

Of course now everything tends to be solid state even terms like "drive" are becoming less common.

by dcminter

2/12/2026 at 8:56:29 PM

Kinda surprising that the article doesn't mention the actual origin of the words:

"Disc" comes from "discus" (the plate thrown in the Olympics)

"Disk" comes from "diskette" (French for "small disc")

I probably just outed myself as a boomer assuming that was common knowledge.

by ghurtado

2/12/2026 at 9:22:28 PM

Disquette*

In French we say disque for both. it's pronounced the same as disk and disc.

by forty

2/12/2026 at 9:03:31 PM

You are (rightfully) saying that they semantically mean kinda the same thing. That doesn't neatly fit any branding guideline though, I'm sorry.

by rf15

2/12/2026 at 9:21:17 PM

Both versions are disque in French. (presumably disquette for "diskette") Don't blame the French for this.

The fact of the matter is that the spelling "disk" probably entered common use from IBM who invented both the hard and the floppy disk, calling the latter the Type 1 Diskette. Enough people were exposed to the "disk" spelling from IBM usage that it kind of stuck, although in the early 1980s the spelling "floppy disc" was sometimes encountered.

by bitwize

2/12/2026 at 9:22:50 PM

Pff! Disc comes from Disco!

by DonHopkins