Subscribing to AP Stylebook Online with the add-on dictionary component makes it easy for you to use your AP Stylebook in concert with the Merriam-Webster dictionary for the most complete guidance.

You can add Merriam-Webster to your order when you subscribe to Stylebook Online, or you can upgrade your existing subscription by going to the My Products page of your account dashboard and clicking the "Upgrade Now" button on the right of the Merriam-Webster line. 

The AP Stylebook now uses Merriam-Webster as our primary dictionary. We don’t take such a switch lightly, as AP style is informed by the spelling and styling recommended by our main dictionary. In recent years, we have seen that Merriam-Webster is more up to date and more in line with our approach.

In making the change to our new primary dictionary, we carefully compared our guidance with Merriam-Webster’s. We believe that a stylebook is different from a dictionary, and in doing this comparison, we eliminated many terms already listed in Merriam-Webster. 

We believe strongly that writers and editors need both a stylebook and a dictionary. They're both important tools that do different jobs.