too (English)

Where does "too" come from?

The word 'too' evolved from the Old English preposition 'tō', which originally carried a sense of 'apart' or 'to'. Over time, this evolved into an adverb meaning 'furthermore' or 'also' in Middle English, before eventually acquiring the modern sense of 'excessive' degree. It shares a common ancestry with the word 'to', though it diverged to fill a unique role in our language.

Full etymology tree

• too (English), 'Likewise.'
  • inherited to (Middle English), 'toe'
    • inherited tō (Old English), 'to, into'
      • inherited *tō (Proto-West Germanic)
        • inherited *tō (Proto-Germanic), 'to'
          • derived *doh₁ (Proto-Indo-European)
            • derived *de (Proto-Indo-European), 'to, towards'

Direct ancestors

• to (Middle English)
• to (Old English)
• to (English)

Updated July 2026

Etymology data from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · About Miraris