Startup or Start Up ?

[RU]

Hi,

Which do you use, startup or start up?

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/start-up
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/start-up​

"Start Up"
321,000,000 results ​

"Startup"
46,100,000​

"start up" - 110,000 searches in Google every month.
"startup" - 135,000 monthly searches.

Please vote.

Thanks

 

[Dominium]

Depends on the context in which the word is used. When speaking with people in branding, design etc, I use startup. When speaking with end-users (or end users or endusers) I use start-up. Rarely do I use start up because there is no explicit indication that the words are to be understood together and this can lead to confusion.

Compound words can be open (two or more words), hyphenated and closed (one word). I think as people become more familiar with a compound its usage moves from open to hyphenated and finally to closed.

 

[Nick]

There are more results for "start up" than "startup" because there are more sentences which use the two words that don't have anything to do with businesses.

"I'm going to start up the engine."

 

[Acroplex]

Both startup and start-up are correct. Anyone old enough to remember e-mail? :D
The dash eventually dropped.

By the way, to get accurate results for "start up" you need to place it in quotes. About 107 MM results.