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animate

adjective · verb

Simple meaning

Possessing the quality or ability of motion.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

anuhmuht

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈænəmət

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

adjective

  1. Possessing the quality or ability of motion.

  2. That lives.

  3. Dynamic, energetic.

verb

  1. transitive

    To give spirit or vigour to; to stimulate or enliven; to inspirit.

  2. transitive

    To impart motion or the appearance of motion to.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
C1 · Advanced
Frequency
Uncommon
Typical Use
Primarily written

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Possessing the quality or ability of motion.

Used this way, animate is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
No strong connotation
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Give

animate nature

Belonging

animate beings

Other combinations

animate worldanimate life

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • animatedadjectiveInflected form

    Having life or vigor or spirit.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • animatornounPerson or profession

    Someone who imparts energy and vitality and spirit to other people.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • animated cartoonnounCompound term

    A film made by photographing a series of cartoon drawings to give the illusion of movement when projected in rapid sequence.

  • animate thingnounCompound term

    A living (or once living) entity.

  • animated oatnounCompound term

    Mediterranean oat held to be progenitor of modern cultivated oat.

  • animate beingnounCompound term

    A living organism characterized by voluntary movement.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: to give spirit or vigour to

inspireenlivenvivifyRare

Antonyms

adjective

Sense: possessing the quality or ability of motion

inanimate

verb

Sense: to give spirit or vigour to

inanimate

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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.