digging

The word “digging” means the act of making holes or excavating earth. In plain terms, the activity of digging, or (old-fashioned/informal) a person’s lodgings.

“Digging” is pronounced DIH-gihng (/ˈdɪɡɪŋ(ɡ)/ in IPA).

Here is “digging” used in a sentence: “The digging for the new foundation took all week.”

“Digging” is a noun.

“Digging” is a fairly common word in modern English.

“Digging” has 2 distinct senses listed in this dictionary. The most common is: the act of making holes or excavating earth.

Because of the standard spelling rule for short verbs: when a one-syllable verb ends in consonant-vowel-consonant, as "dig" does, the final consonant doubles before -ing to keep the vowel short. Without the doubling, "diging" would look as if it had a long vowel, like "hiking."

They describe the same activity at different registers. "Digging" is the everyday word for making holes or turning over earth, while "excavation" is the formal or technical term used in construction and archaeology, where it implies careful, systematic work.

The informal word "digs," meaning rented rooms or lodgings, is a shortening of "diggings," an older informal term for the place where one lives. So "moving into new digs" traces back to this plural sense of digging rather than to holes in the ground.

Not in meaning. In "I'm really digging this song," digging is the informal slang verb dig, meaning to like or enjoy something. It is casual in register and entirely separate from the literal sense of excavating earth.