The two words “begin” and “start” are very close, but many learners are shocked when they hear that one of their uses were awkward. Natives do hear a difference, and it is very subtle.
Begin is usually about processes
When something begins, we are talking about something that takes a long time, or at least not on and off.
I begin my day with a cold shower.
= In the early minutes of my day, I take a cold shower.
We are discussing the early moments of the day, which is a long 24-hour process.
We began our workout with a light jog.
= At the early moments of our exercise, we ran a little bit.
There were earlier exercises and later exercises. We want to focus on the earlier ones.
Start is about the sudden trigger or binary things
When something starts, we are talking about the sudden start, or we are talking about something that has only TWO possibilities: working or not working.
The students started taking notes when the teacher said it would be on the test.
= They were not writing, and suddenly everyone wrote at the same time.
You have two options: write or not write. Here, we go from one option to another.
When she told me her mom was sick, I started to worry.
= The moment I heard the bad news, worries appeared in my heart.
There is one second when you hear news. We want to describe that first reaction.
Where they are different
If you are discussing the exact moment of something that starts, you use start.
I can’t start my car.
= The car will not turn on.
Cars can only be on or off. There is no process.
If you are discussing the early moments of something that begins, you use begin. What is early depends on the situation. Early for class is the first 20 minutes. Early for your life is the first 20 years.
When class began, I stopped paying attention.
= In the early minutes of class, I did not listen.
Class is one hour, so there is a beginning, middle, and end.
Things you cannot begin
I begin my car.He began the oven.They have begun the TV.
You can start all of those things.
However, there are no actions exclusive to start because it can change the focus to an exact moment. The choice between “start” and “begin” just change the focus between the early moments of a process to the exact moment that the process triggers.
This difference extends to the noun forms
The noun version of start is start. The noun version of begin is beginning. The same differences exist for the nouns.
The start of class is at 8:00am.
= The exact moment when we learn is 8.
There is only one start. It is at one minute.
The beginning of class is the time to discuss our homework.
= The early minutes of class is the time for homework.
Discussion takes time, so it must happen at the beginning, not the start, which is when the bell rings.
There was a lot of tragedy at the start of his life.
= A lot of bad things happen the day he was born.
There was a lot of tragedy at the beginning of his life.
= A lot of bad things happened when he was a child.
Summary
- begin: the process goes
- start: on/off verbs (like a car), the exact moment when an action is performed
This is a very small difference, but it can be very useful.
If you master the difference between these two verbs, you can learn a lot about native speakers’ mentality. For example, if someone says, “my life cannot start until I move out of my parents’ house,” they think that there is one moment when their true life will start. This moment is not part of process; life either happens, or it does not happen.
Look out for nuances like that in natives’ sentences, and try to use begin or start yourself.
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