Guides & questions · 2026-09-19 · 8-minute read
"Chauffeur" is one of the most searched-for spellings in English, and it deserves to be: a French loanword with a silent letter, a double consonant, a vowel cluster that does not occur in native English words, and a pronunciation that sits between two stresses depending on which side of the Atlantic you are on. This short article settles the spelling, the pronunciation and the grammar, and then explains where the word came from, which is a better story than most people expect.
The correct spelling is chauffeur: c-h-a-u-f-f-e-u-r. Nine letters, double f, the vowel clusters "au" and "eu". Common misspellings are chauffer, chaffeur, chauffuer, chaufer and shofer. The plural is chauffeurs. It is pronounced "SHOH-fur" in British English and either "SHOH-fur" or "shoh-FUR" in American English. The word is French and originally meant a stoker - the person who kept a steam engine's fire going - which is why the French verb chauffer means "to heat".
The spelling, letter by letter
C-H-A-U-F-F-E-U-R.
The "ch" is pronounced "sh", as in most French loanwords (champagne, chef, chic). The "au" is a single vowel sound, "oh". The double "f" is the part most people drop; "chaufeur" with one f is the commonest error in written English. The "eu" is another single vowel, close to "ur" or the vowel in "fur". The final "r" is sounded in American English and mostly not in British.
The most frequent misspellings, in roughly the order search engines see them:
- chauffer - the second most common, and confusingly a real French word (the verb "to heat"), which is why some dictionaries list it. In English it is wrong for the job.
- chaffeur - the "u" dropped from the first syllable.
- chauffuer - the "e" and "u" transposed.
- chaufer - one f, and the second vowel cluster simplified.
- shofer and shoffer - phonetic spellings, occasionally used deliberately in old American slang.
- chauffuer, chauffure, chauffer with a doubled r - rarer.
If you remember one thing: double f, then "eur" like "entrepreneur" and "amateur", which are the same French ending.
Pronunciation
In British English the stress is on the first syllable: SHOH-fuh, with the final r barely sounded. In American English both SHOH-fur and shoh-FUR are standard; the second, with the stress on the last syllable, is closer to the French and slightly more formal. Neither is wrong. The verb "to chauffeur" - "she chauffeured the delegation around the city" - follows the same pattern, and "chauffeured" is spelled with the double f and the "eu" intact.
Plural, feminine and related forms
The plural is chauffeurs, simply adding an s. The French feminine form is chauffeuse, which exists in English dictionaries but is rare in practice; a woman who drives professionally is a chauffeur, and the industry has used the single term for both for decades. "Chauffeuse" is more often encountered as the name of a low, armless fireside chair, which comes from the same heating root: a chair for warming yourself.
The adjective is chauffeured ("a chauffeured car"), and the noun for the service is chauffeuring or, more commonly, "chauffeur service". "Chauffeur-driven" is the standard compound for a vehicle that comes with its driver, and it is the phrase we use throughout the services pages.
Where the word comes from
The French verb chauffer means "to heat"; a chauffeur was originally a stoker, the man who fed coal into the firebox of a steam engine on a locomotive or a ship. When the first motor cars appeared in France in the 1890s, many of them were steam-powered, and the person who operated one had to get the boiler up to pressure before it would move - literally a heater, a chauffeur. The name transferred from the steam car to the internal-combustion car within a few years, and by 1899 the word was in use in English newspapers for a person employed to drive a motor car.
There is a darker earlier sense. In the 1790s a band of brigands in northern France, the chauffeurs, were so called because they held their victims' feet to the fire to make them reveal where their valuables were hidden. The two meanings share the root but not the lineage; the motoring word came from the steam engine, not the brigands, though etymologists enjoy pointing out that both involved a fire and a certain insistence.
By the 1910s the chauffeur was a recognised profession with its own associations, uniforms, schools and licences, and the word had settled into the meaning it has now: a professional who drives others. What that job involves today is set out in what is a chauffeur, and the history of the vehicle is in the Wikipedia article on the limousine, which traces its own French origin to the region of Limousin.
"Chauffeur" versus "driver" in usage
The two words are not interchangeable in careful writing. "Driver" is neutral: anyone operating a vehicle. "Chauffeur" implies a professional employed to drive others, usually in a vehicle of some quality, and it carries connotations of service, uniform and discretion. A bus has a driver. A rideshare has a driver. An executive car has a chauffeur. The black car service explainer covers the practical differences between those three; the chauffeur vs Uber Black guide works through when each is the right call.
"Chauffeur" is also used as a verb, sometimes slightly ironically, for driving someone around as a favour: "I spent Saturday chauffeuring the kids to football." The professional usage is the original one.
Related terms you will see on booking sites
- Black car service - American English for a chauffeured sedan or SUV booked in advance.
- Executive car service - the same, with a corporate emphasis.
- Private hire - British regulatory term for pre-booked, chauffeur-driven vehicles.
- VTC (voiture de transport avec chauffeur) - the French and Spanish licensing category.
- NCC (noleggio con conducente, hire with driver) - the Italian equivalent.
- Limo service - in North America, usually a chauffeured sedan rather than a stretch; see how much does a limo cost.
- Meet and greet - the chauffeur waiting in the arrivals hall with a name board, described in how airport transfers work.
In other languages
The word has been borrowed almost everywhere. German uses Chauffeur alongside the native Fahrer; Spanish has chofer (with the Spanish spelling and stress on the first syllable) as the everyday word for a driver; Portuguese has chofer and motorista; Italian uses autista but understands chauffeur; Arabic borrowed shufeer early in the twentieth century and it remains the common word in the Gulf; Russian has shofyor; Turkish has şoför. The spread reflects the spread of the motor car itself: the French built the first ones, the French word went with them.
A note on our own usage
On this site we use "chauffeur" for the person and "chauffeur service" or "chauffeur-driven" for the product, in every one of the 107 countries we cover, because the standard is the same everywhere even when the local word is different. The person who meets you at Heathrow or Changi with a name board is a chauffeur in the full sense described above: licensed, trained, discreet, and employed to make your journey their job.
Why English speakers find it hard
Three features of the word conspire against the speller. First, the "ch" is pronounced "sh", which is the French rule and the opposite of the native English one (church, chair); English speakers who spell by ear reach for "sh". Second, the "au" and "eu" clusters do not occur in Germanic English words, so there is no native pattern to lean on, and the two are easily transposed ("chuaffeur", "chauffuer"). Third, the double "f" is silent in the sense that a single "f" would sound the same, so the ear gives no warning when it is dropped. Add that the word is heard far more often than it is read - people say "chauffeur" and see "driver" - and the misspelling rate makes sense.
The words that share its ending are the memory aid: amateur, entrepreneur, connoisseur, restaurateur, saboteur, voyeur, masseur, raconteur. All French, all "-eur", all with the same final sound. If you can spell "entrepreneur" you can spell "chauffeur"; the only extra hazard is the double f, and the mnemonic for that is "two f's for the fire", the stoker feeding coal into the firebox with both hands.
The word in dictionaries
The Oxford English Dictionary dates the English use of "chauffeur" for a motor-car driver to 1899, in a magazine describing the new sport of motoring; the French sense of stoker is a century older. Merriam-Webster gives the same date and lists both pronunciations. The word was originally italicised in English as a foreign borrowing and lost the italics by the 1920s, when the job had become common enough that the word was simply English. Dictionaries also record "chauffeuse" (the feminine, and the chair) and the verb, with "chauffeured" and "chauffeuring" as the inflected forms. The past participle keeps the double f and the "eu"; "chauffered" is a misspelling.
The job title on documents
If you are writing the word on an invoice, a contract, a licence application or a job advertisement, the conventions are these. The noun is lower-case in running text ("the chauffeur will meet you"), capitalised in a job title on a letterhead or a name badge ("Chauffeur, Executive Fleet"). "Chauffeur-driven" takes a hyphen as a compound adjective before a noun ("a chauffeur-driven car") and no hyphen after ("the car was chauffeur driven"), though usage varies and the hyphen is never wrong. "Chauffeur service" and "chauffeur services" are two words, not hyphenated. Regulators use their own terms - "private hire driver" in the UK, "for-hire driver" in New York - and those are the words that appear on the licence itself.
The short version
Chauffeur. Double f. Ends like entrepreneur. Say "SHOH-fur". From the French for "heater", because the first ones stoked steam cars. It means a professional employed to drive others, and the professional it means is described in what is a chauffeur. If you have got this far and still want one, the booker does not require you to spell it.
A test, and the answers
Which of these are spelled correctly? The chauffer opened the door. The chauffeur opened the door. We were chauffeured to the hotel. She works as a chauffuer. The company employs twelve chauffeurs. He chauffered the guests all evening. Only the second, third and fifth are right. "Chauffer" and "chauffered" drop the second vowel of the "eu" cluster; "chauffuer" transposes it. The double f survives in every correct form, and the "eu" in every one but the plural, which simply adds an s.
One last trap: autocorrect. Most phone keyboards will offer "chauffeur" once you have typed "chauff", and will silently accept "chauffer" because it is in the dictionary as a different word. If the sentence is about a person who drives, check that the word ends "-eur" before you send it. The chauffeur meeting you at the airport, whose name and photo arrive by text on the morning of travel, will not mind either way; the confirmation from the reservations desk spells it for you. And if the question behind the search was really "what does a chauffeur cost", that answer is in the cost guide, with the word spelled correctly throughout.
